Preference information collecting system, device, method, and program

ABSTRACT

A preference-information gathering system is capable of gathering information on every commodity and/or every service, which are each of interest to a user, as user&#39;s preference information. The preference-information gathering system includes a user portable terminal ( 102 ) capable of storing a user identifier uniquely identifying the user, an information searching apparatus ( 104 ) and a preference-information management apparatus ( 114 ) for managing the information on preferences with the user. The information searching apparatus ( 104 ) has a search-information inputting unit ( 108 ) for requesting a user to enter search information to be used in a process to search for information desired by the user and a user-identifier acquisition unit ( 110 ) for acquiring a user identifier. The information searching apparatus ( 104 ) transmits information found in a search process requested by the user as the desired information on a commodity and/or a service and the user identifier to the preference-information management apparatus by associating the information and the identifier with each other.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present invention relates to a preference-information gatheringsystem, an information searching apparatus, a user portable terminal, apassed-place-information sender apparatus, a preference-informationgathering method, and a computer program.

BACKGROUND ART

In the past, generally, enterprises or other institutions producingcommodities and/or services provide customers with information on thecommodities and/or the services by using typically leaflets, directmails, electronic mails, and/or web advertisements. The information oncommodities, and/or services includes discount coupons, information onnew commodities, and information on discounted sales in order to promotethe purchasing will of the customers. In order to promote the purchasingwill of the customers, however, distribution of information tailored topreferences with specific customers to the specific customers is moreeffective than distribution of the same information to all thecustomers. In order to distribute information tailored to preferenceswith specific customers to the customers, it is necessary to provide asystem for inferring the preferences with the customers from purchasingrecords of the customers and provide the customers with informationtailored to the preferences. For more information on such a system, thereader is suggested to refer to references such as Japanese PatentLaid-open No. 2003-248774 and Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 2003-308267.

This system provides customers with information on commodities, to whicha coupon is applicable, in accordance with purchasing records of thecustomers and electronic coupons each showing a discount rate. Thus, acustomer can obtain a coupon showing a higher discount rate for acommodity purchased by the customer frequently.

In the system described above, however, the only criterion used fordetermining a preference with a customer in a process to issue a couponto the customer is the purchasing records of the customer. That is tosay, a preference with a customer is determined on the basis ofcommodities purchased before by the customer. Thus, the criterion usedfor determining a preference with a customer does not includeconsideration of a commodity not purchased by the customer before eventhough the commodity may be of interest to the customer.

It is thus an object of the present invention, which addresses theproblem described above, to provide a preference-information gatheringsystem, an information searching apparatus, a user portable terminal, apassed-place-information sender apparatus, a preference-informationgathering method, and a computer program capable of gatheringinformation on every commodity and/or every service, which are each ofinterest to the customer, as information on customer's preferences.

DISCLOSURE OF INVENTION

In order to solve the problem described above, in accordance with anaspect of the present invention, there is provided apreference-information gathering system capable of gathering user'spreference information. The preference-information gathering system has:

an information searching apparatus capable of searching for informationon every commodity and/or every service, which are each desired by theusers; and

a preference-information management server connected by a communicationnetwork to the information searching apparatus and used for managing theinformation on preferences with the users.

The information searching apparatus includes:

a commodity/service-information storage unit for storing information oncommodities and/or services;

a search-information inputting unit for requesting a user to entersearch information;

a search-result acquisition unit for searching thecommodity/service-information storage unit for information desired bythe user on the basis of the search information;

a user-identifier acquisition unit for acquiring a user identifieridentifying the user entering the search information to thesearch-information inputting unit; and

a search-result sender unit for transmitting a search result acquired bythe search-result acquisition unit and the user identifier to thepreference-information management server by associating the searchresult and the user identifier with each other.

On the other hand, the preference-information management serverincludes:

a preference-information storage unit for storing the user's preferenceinformation for each of the users;

a search-result receiver unit for receiving the search result and theuser identifier from the information searching apparatus; and

a preference-information updating unit for updating user-preferenceinformation stored in the preference-information storage unit on thebasis of the search result and the user identifier, which are receivedby the search-result receiver unit.

In accordance with the preference-information gathering system providedby the present invention as described above, information found in asearch process carried out by the information searching apparatus at arequest made by the user as information on a commodity or a service canbe managed by the preference-information management server as user'spreference information. In addition, information of interest to a usercan be gathered as user's preference information.

In order to solve the problem described above, in accordance withanother aspect of the present invention, there is provided apreference-information gathering system for gathering user's preferenceinformation. The preference-information gathering system has:

a user portable terminal, which can be carried by a user; and

a preference-information management server connected by a communicationnetwork to the user portable terminal and used for managing the user'spreference information.

The user portable terminal includes:

a commodity/service-identifier inputting unit for inputting anidentifier identifying a commodity and/or a service;

a commodity/service-identifier storage unit for storing thecommodity/service identifier; and

a commodity/service-information sender unit for transmitting thecommodity/service identifier and a user identifier identifying the userto the preference-information management server by associating thecommodity/service identifier and the user identifier with each other.

On the other hand, the preference-information management serverincludes:

a preference-information storage unit for storing the user's preferenceinformation for each of the users;

a commodity/service-information receiver unit for receiving thecommodity/service identifier and the user identifier from the userportable terminal; and

a preference-information updating unit for updating user-preferenceinformation stored in the preference-information storage unit on thebasis of the commodity/service identifier and the user identifier, whichare received by the commodity/service-information receiver unit.

In accordance with the preference-information gathering system providedby the present invention as described above, the user enters anidentifier identifying a commodity or service of interest to the user tothe commodity/service-identifier inputting unit employed in the userportable terminal. The user then operates the user portable terminal totransmit the commodity/service identifier to the preference-informationmanagement server along with a user identifier identifying the user. Thecommodity/service identifier and the user identifier enable thepreference-information management server to manage information on acommodity and/or a service, which are of interest to the user identifiedby the user identifier, as user's preference information by handling thecommodity and/or service identified by the commodity/service identifieras a commodity or service of interest to the user.

In order to solve the problem described above, in accordance with afurther aspect of the present invention, there is provided apreference-information gathering system for gathering user's preferenceinformation. The preference-information gathering system includes:

a user portable terminal, which can be carried by a user;

a passed-place-information sender apparatus carrying out communicationswith the user portable terminal; and

a preference-information management server connected by a communicationnetwork to the passed-place-information sender apparatus and used formanaging the user's preference information.

The user portable terminal has a user-identifier storage unit forstoring a user identifier identifying the user.

The passed-place-information sender apparatus includes:

a user-identifier acquisition unit for acquiring the user identifierfrom the user portable terminal; and

a passed-place-information sender unit for transmitting an apparatusidentifier identifying the passed-place-information sender apparatus andthe user identifier to the preference-information management server byassociating the apparatus identifier and the user identifier with eachother.

The preference-information management server includes:

a preference-information storage unit for storing the user's preferenceinformation for each of the users;

a passed-place-information receiver unit for receiving the apparatusidentifier and the user identifier from the passed-place-informationsender apparatus; and

a preference-information updating unit for updating user-preferenceinformation stored in the preference-information storage unit on thebasis of the apparatus identifier and the user identifier, which arereceived by the passed-place-information receiver unit.

According to the present invention as described above, the user takesthe user portable terminal to such a place that thepassed-place-information sender apparatus is capable of recognizing theuser identifier stored in the user portable terminal. Then, thepassed-place-information sender apparatus transmits the recognized useridentifier to the preference-information management server along with anapparatus identifier identifying the passed-place-information senderapparatus. In this way, the preference-information management server iscapable of managing information on the passed-place-information senderapparatus identified by the apparatus identifier as user's preferenceinformation identified by the user identifier.

In order to solve the problem described above, in accordance with afurther aspect of the present invention, there are providedpreference-information gathering methods for implementing thepreference-information gathering systems described above.

In order to solve the problem described above, in accordance with afurther aspect of the present invention, there is provided aninformation searching apparatus, which is connected by a communicationnetwork to a preference-information management server for managinguser's preference information and is used for providing information tobe reflected in the user's preference information to thepreference-information management server. The information searchingapparatus includes:

a commodity/service-information storage unit for storing information oncommodities and/or services;

a search-information inputting unit for requesting a user to entersearch information;

a search-result acquisition unit for searching thecommodity/service-information storage unit for information desired bythe user on the basis of the search information;

a user-identifier acquisition unit for acquiring a user identifieridentifying the user entering the search information to thesearch-information inputting unit; and

a search-result sender unit for transmitting a search result acquired bythe search-result acquisition unit and the user identifier to thepreference-information management server by associating the searchresult and the user identifier with each other.

According to the present invention as described above, thesearch-information inputting unit requests a user to enter searchinformation and the search-result acquisition unit searches thecommodity/service-information storage unit for a search resultrepresenting information desired by the user on the basis of the searchinformation. Then, the search-result sender unit transmits the searchresult and the user identifier identifying the user acquired by thesearch-result acquisition unit to the preference-information managementserver by associating the search result and the user identifier witheach other. In this way, the commodity/service information obtained as aresult of a search process requested by the user can be transmitted tothe preference-information management server. In other words,information inferred to be information of interest to the user can betransmitted to the preference-information management server. It is to benoted that the commodity/service-information storage unit can also beprovided in a computer external to the information searching apparatus.In this case of such a configuration, the information searchingapparatus searches the commodity/service-information storage unitprovided in the computer through a communication network or the like forinformation desired by the user.

In the information searching apparatus described above, informationstored in the commodity/service-information storage unit is a digitalcontent including a text, a stationary picture, a moving picture, and asound, which are related to the commodity and/or the service.

The information searching apparatus described above may be configured tofurther have a search-result outputting unit for outputting the searchresult. With such a configuration, in a process to gather information onpreferences with the user, the information searching apparatus iscapable of showing information desired by the user to the user.

The search-information inputting unit can also be configured to receivethe search information from a user portable terminal having the searchinformation stored in a memory employed in the user portable terminal.With such a configuration, the user can typically create searchinformation and store the search information in advance in the userportable terminal. Then, the information searching apparatus receivesthe search information from the user portable terminal and uses thesearch information to search for desired information. Thus, theinformation searching apparatus provides convenience to the user.

The user-identifier acquisition unit can also be configured to receivethe user identifier from a user portable terminal having the useridentifier stored in a memory employed in the user portable terminal.With such a configuration, the user does not have to memorize the useridentifier of its own. Thus, the information searching apparatusprovides convenience to the user.

The search-result sender unit employed can also be configured totransmit the search information itself to the preference-informationmanagement server if the search-result acquisition unit is not capableof acquiring information desired by the user from thecommodity/service-information storage unit on the basis of the searchinformation. With such a configuration, even if information on acommodity and/or a service, which are desired by the user, is not storedin the commodity/service-information storage unit, the searchinformation entered by the user can be transmitted to thepreference-information management server as information on a commodityand/or a service, which are of interest to the user.

In order to solve the problem described above, in accordance with afurther aspect of the present invention, a user portable terminal isconnected by a communication network to a preference-informationmanagement server for managing user's preference information and is usedfor providing information to be reflected in the user's preferenceinformation to the preference-information management server. The userportable terminal includes:

a commodity/service-identifier inputting unit for inputting anidentifier identifying a commodity and/or a service;

a commodity/service-identifier storage unit for storing thecommodity/service identifier; and

a commodity/service-information sender unit for transmitting thecommodity/service identifier and a user identifier identifying the userto the preference-information management server by associating thecommodity/service identifier and the user identifier with each other.

According to the present invention as described above, thecommodity/service-identifier inputting unit inputs an identifieridentifying a commodity or a service and stores the identifier in thecommodity/service-identifier storage unit. Then, thecommodity/service-information sender unit transmits thecommodity/service identifier and a user identifier identifying the userto the preference-information management server. That is to say,information acquired by the user as information on a commodity or aservice can be transmitted to the preference-information managementserver. In other words, information inferred to be information ofinterest to the user can be transmitted to the preference-informationmanagement server. It is to be noted that thecommodity/service-identifier inputting unit may also input thecommodity/service identifier as an identifier entered manually by theuser. For example, the commodity/service-identifier inputting unitinputs the commodity/service identifier by reading out the identifierfrom a two-dimensional barcode or the like. As an alternative, thecommodity/service-identifier inputting unit inputs the commodity/serviceidentifier by receiving the identifier from an IC tag or the like.

In order to solve the problem described above, in accordance with afurther aspect of the present invention, a passed-place-informationsender apparatus, which is connected by a communication network to apreference-information management server for managing user's preferenceinformation, is used for carrying communications with a user portableterminal a user can carry and is used for providing information to bereflected in the user's preference information to thepreference-information management server. The passed-place-informationsender apparatus includes:

a user-identifier acquisition unit for acquiring a user identifieridentifying the user from the user portable terminal; and

a passed-place-information sender unit for transmitting an apparatusidentifier identifying the passed-place-information sender apparatus andthe user identifier to the preference-information management server byassociating the apparatus identifier and the user identifier with eachother.

According to the present invention as described above, theuser-identifier acquisition unit acquires a user identifier from theuser portable terminal. The passed-place-information sender unit is thuscapable of transmitting an apparatus identifier identifying thepassed-place-information sender apparatus and the user identifier to thepreference-information management server by associating the apparatusidentifier and the user identifier with each other. In other words, theidentifier by which the user identifies the passed-place-informationsender apparatus can be sent to the preference information managementserver.

The user-identifier acquisition unit described above may also beconfigured to acquire the user identifier from the user portableterminal by adoption of a non-contact communication. The non-contactcommunication is a communication in which the user portable terminal isnot brought into physical contact with the passed-place-informationsender apparatus or, even if the user portable terminal is brought intophysical contact with the passed-place-information sender apparatus, theuser portable terminal is not brought into electrical contact with thepassed-place-information sender apparatus. A user portable terminalhaving such a configuration is convenient for the user in that the userneeds only to take the user portable terminal to a location in closeproximity to the passed-place-information sender apparatus. Thus, thenon-contact communication is a radio communication. It is desirable tomainly carry out a non-contact communication only within a narrow rangeof the order of about 10 cm in conformity with NFC (Near FieldCommunication) standards specifying an RF carrier frequency of 13.56 MHzand a maximum communication speed of 212 Kbps.

The passed-place-information sender apparatus described above may alsobe configured to further have a transmission determining unit fordetermining whether or not to transmit the user identifier acquired bythe user-identifier acquisition unit to the preference-informationmanagement server on the basis of the user identifier itself. With sucha configuration, the transmission determining unit may make a decisionof not transmitting the user identifier of a user to thepreference-information management server in accordance a request made bythe user in advance as a request not to transmit the identifier.

In addition, there are also provided computer programs to be executed bytheir respective computers functioning respectively as the informationsearching apparatus, the user portable terminal, and thepassed-place-information sender apparatus, which have been describedabove. On the top of that, there are also provided recording mediumsused for recording the computer programs in such a format that theprograms can be read out by the computers.

As described above, in accordance with the present invention, it ispossible to provide, among others, a preference-information gatheringsystem capable of gathering information on each commodity and/or aservice, which are of interest to a user, as user's preferenceinformation.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram showing the overall configuration of apreference-information gathering system according to an embodiment ofthe present invention as well as an information providing system and anelectronic-value distribution system, which are related to thepreference-information gathering system.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the configurations of an informationsearching apparatus and a preference-information management server,which are employed in a first embodiment implementing thepreference-information gathering system.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram showing a typicalpreference-information storage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing a typicalpreference-information storage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 5 shows a flowchart representing processing to gather preferenceinformation in the same embodiment.

FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram showing the overall configuration of apreference-information gathering system according to a secondembodiment.

FIG. 7 is a block diagram showing the configurations of a user portableterminal and a preference-information management server, which areincluded in the same embodiment.

FIG. 8 is an explanatory diagram showing a typicalpreference-information storage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 9 is an explanatory diagram showing a typicalpreference-information storage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 10 shows a flowchart representing processing to gather preferenceinformation in the same embodiment.

FIG. 11 is an explanatory diagram showing the overall configuration of apreference-information gathering system according to a third embodiment.

FIG. 12 is a block diagram showing the configurations of a user portableterminal, a passed-place-information sender apparatus, and apreference-information management server, which are included in the sameembodiment.

FIG. 13 is an explanatory diagram showing a typicalpreference-information storage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 14 shows a flowchart representing processing to gather preferenceinformation in the same embodiment.

FIG. 15 is a block diagram showing the configurations of a user portableterminal, a timing providing apparatus, and an information providingserver, which are included in a first embodiment implementing aninformation providing system.

FIG. 16 is an explanatory diagram showing a typicalpreference-information storage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 17 shows a flowchart representing processing to provide informationin the same embodiment.

FIG. 18 is an explanatory diagram showing the overall configuration ofan information providing system according to a second embodiment.

FIG. 19 is a block diagram showing the configurations of a user portableterminal, a timing providing apparatus, and an information providingserver, which are included in the same embodiment.

FIG. 20 is an explanatory diagram showing typical classified informationstored in a classified information storage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 21 is an explanatory diagram showing a typical provided-informationstorage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 22 shows a flowchart representing processing to provide the userwith information in the same embodiment.

FIG. 23 is a block diagram showing the configurations of a user portableterminal, an electronic-value distribution apparatus, and anelectronic-value issuing server, which are included in a firstembodiment implementing an electronic-value distribution system.

FIG. 24 is an explanatory diagram showing a typicalpreference-information storage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 25 is an explanatory diagram showing a typical electronic-valueaccumulation unit and an electronic-value storage unit in the sameembodiment.

FIG. 26 shows a flowchart representing processing to distributeelectronic values to users in the same embodiment.

FIG. 27 is a block diagram showing the configurations of a user portableterminal, an electronic-value distribution apparatus, and anelectronic-value issuing server, which are included in a secondembodiment implementing an electronic-value distribution system.

FIG. 28 is an explanatory diagram showing typical information stored inan electronic value temporary storage unit in the same embodiment.

FIG. 29 shows a flowchart representing processing to transmit anelectronic value to the user in the same embodiment.

BEST MODES FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION

Preferred embodiments of the present invention are explained byreferring to diagrams as follows. It is to be noted that configurationelements having essentially the same functional configuration aredenoted by the same reference numeral throughout this patentspecification and the diagrams in order to avoid duplications ofexplanation.

The preference-information gathering system according to an embodimentis capable of gathering not only information based on purchasing recordsof the user as user's preference information, but also information oncommodities/services that were not purchased by the user before but areof interest to the user. The user's preference information is utilizedin an operation to provide the user with information. It is thuspossible to provide an information providing system related to theembodiment.

In accordance with the conventional information providing system, timingto provide the user with commodity/service information is determinedarbitrarily by a service providing company. Thus, in many cases, theuser cannot effectively utilize the information even if the userreceives the information. For example, even if a discount coupon issuedfor a commodity has been provided to a user, the user forgets to bringthe coupon to a store or the like when the user visits the store so thatthe user cannot take advantage of the discount provided by the coupon.As another example, information on sales has been given to a user but,when the user actually visits a store providing the information, thesales season has ended. In such cases, the user cannot possibly takeadvantage of the information provided by the service providing companyand, at the same time, it is quite within the bounds of possibility thatthe service providing company is also incapable of promoting the saleseffectively because the user does not utilize the information. Inaddition, as disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 2003-308267,there has been developed a system for providing information desired by auser to the user with timing also desired by the user. In accordancewith this system, when an IC tag or the like having an identifier usedfor uniquely identifying a user is brought to a position in closeproximity to an advertisement/announcement media having a function toread out information from the IC tag or the like, information such as acoupon managed by being associated with the advertisement/announcementmedia is transmitted as an email to typically the mobile telephone ofthe user identified by the identifier read out from the electronic tagor the like. In accordance with this system, however, the serviceproviding company merely provides the user with information oncommodities or the like requested by the user with timing also requestedby the user, but the service providing company is not capable ofproviding information not requested by the user. Thus, the system has aproblem that the information provided by the service providing companyto the user hardly promotes sales.

In order to solve this problem, an information providing systemaccording to an embodiment is capable of providing the user withinformation proper for the user with timing also suitable for the user.In order to provide the user with information proper for the user withtiming also suitable for the user, the information providing system isprovided with a timing providing apparatus for notifying a server oftiming to provide information to the user. To put it concretely, thetiming providing apparatus is used for carrying out communications withboth a user portable terminal that can be carried by the user and aninformation providing server for providing the user withcommodity/service information. The timing providing apparatus includes:

a user-identifier receiver unit for receiving the user identifier fromthe user portable terminal;

a timing-information sender unit for transmitting the user identifier tothe information providing server right after the user-identifierreceiver unit receives the identifier; and

a provided-information relay unit for receiving commodity/serviceinformation from the information providing server and passing on theinformation to the user portable terminal. Other information such as amore concrete configuration and a more concrete method will be describedlater.

In accordance with a preference-information gathering system implementedby an embodiment and an information providing system provided as asystem related to the preference-information gathering system, it ispossible to gather information of interest to a user as user'spreference information and provide the user with the preferenceinformation as information suitable for the user with timing appropriatefor the user. In addition, if the service providing company is capableof knowing whether or not the user has taken advantage of theinformation provided to the user after receiving the information, thecompany is capable of confirming the user's preference.

In the past, however, a user utilized a coupon issued to the user astypical information provided by the service providing company bybringing the coupon to a store. As an alternative, the user showed thecoupon to an employee working in the store by displaying the coupon on adisplay screen of a mobile telephone or the like. By using a coupon inthis way, nevertheless, the service providing company serving as themain institution issuing the coupon as a kind of commodity/serviceinformation is not capable of knowing a person using the coupon afterthe issuance of the coupon. For example, a coupon issued to a specificuser may be used by a person other than the specific user to whom thecoupon has been specially issued in some cases. In such cases, theservice providing company is not capable of knowing the transfer of theissued coupon to the person other than the specific user. Thus, theservice providing company may issue another coupon to the person alreadyusing the coupon. As a result, it is difficult to promote sales. Inaddition, as disclosed in a reference such as Japanese Patent Laid-openNo. 2003-248774, there has been developed a system for acquiringinformation on a customer taking advantage of an electronic coupon anddetermining the type of a coupon to be issued next to the customer onthe basis of the utilization of the coupon. In accordance with thissystem, an electronic coupon made from a two-dimensional code ispresented to the mobile telephone or the like of a user and informationon the user is acquired by acquiring the two-dimensional code when thecoupon is used. Then, the type of a coupon to be issued next to the useris determined on the basis of the information on the user. Nevertheless,the system is capable of merely acquiring the information on utilizationof an electronic coupon when the user purchases a commodity for whichthe coupon has been issued, but by no means capable of acquiring thestate of distribution of the coupon in case the coupon has beentransferred from the recipient of the coupon to another person.

In order to solve the above problem, in accordance with an embodiment,there has been provided an electronic-value distribution system in whichan electronic-value providing company is capable of acquiringdistribution information of electronic values including electroniccoupons. In order to allow an electronic-value providing company toacquire distribution information of electronic values, theelectronic-value distribution system is provided with anelectronic-value distribution apparatus. To put it concretely, theelectronic-value distribution apparatus allows electronic values issuedby an electronic-value issuing server as electronic values related to acommodity and/or a service or a plurality of commodities/services to beexchanged among user portable terminals. The electronic-valuedistribution apparatus includes:

an electronic-value receiver section for receiving an electronic valuefrom a user portable terminal; and

an electronic-value sender section for transmitting an electronic valueto a user portable terminal.

The electronic-value distribution apparatus allows an electronic valueto be exchanged among a plurality of aforementioned user portableterminals. Other information such as a more concrete configuration and amore concrete method will be described later.

The preference-information gathering system, the information providingsystem, and the electronic-value distribution system are configured as asystem 100, which has a configuration typically including user portableterminals 102 a, 102 b, and so on, an information processing apparatus104, a communication network 112 as well as a server 114 as shown inFIG. 1. The user portable terminals 102, the information processingapparatus 104, the communication network 112, and the server 114 eachhave different functions bringing about a variety of effects in each ofthe systems. In order to make the following description of each of thesystems easy to understand, the information processing apparatus 104 andthe server 114 are each denoted by a unique technical term reflectingcharacteristics of each of the systems. To put it concretely, in thepreference-information gathering system, the information processingapparatus 104 is referred to as an information searching apparatus 104and the server 114 is referred to as a preference-information managementapparatus 114. By the same token, in the information providing system,the information processing apparatus 104 and the server 114 are referredto as a timing providing apparatus 104 and an information providingserver 114 respectively. In the same way, in the electronic-valuedistribution system, the information processing apparatus 104 and theserver 114 are referred to as an electronic-value distribution apparatus104 and an electronic-value distribution server 114 respectively. Inaddition, in the following description of each of the systems, an outputunit 106, an input unit 108, and a communication unit 110, which areemployed in the information processing apparatus 104, are each denotedby a unique technical term reflecting characteristics of each of thesystems. To put it concretely, in the preference-information gatheringsystem, the output unit 106, the input unit 108, and the communicationunit 110 are referred to as a search-result outputting unit 106, asearch-information inputting unit 108, and a user-identifier acquisitionunit 110 respectively. By the same token, in the information providingsystem, the output unit 106 and the communication unit 110 are referredto as a presented-information outputting unit 106 and a user-identifierreceiver unit 110 respectively. In the same way, in the electronic-valuedistribution system, the output unit 106, the input unit 108, and thecommunication unit 110 are referred to as a display unit 106, anelectronic-coupon selection unit 108, and a non-contact communicationunit 110 respectively. On the top of that, in the following descriptionof each of the systems, the system 100 is denoted by a unique technicalterm reflecting characteristics of each of the systems. To put itconcretely, in the descriptions of the preference-information gatheringsystem, the information-providing system, and the electronic-valuedistribution system, reference numeral 100 denotes different systems,i.e., a preference-information gathering system 100, an informationproviding system 100, and an electronic-value distribution system 100respectively.

<1. Preference-Information Gathering System>

First Embodiment

A first embodiment implements a preference-information gathering system100 capable of gathering commodity/service information as user'spreference information. The commodity/service information is obtained asa result of a process to search for commodity/service information on thebasis of user's preference.

First of all, the entire configuration of the preference-informationgathering system 100 according to the embodiment is explained byreferring to FIG. 1. As shown in the figure, the preference-informationgathering system 100 has a configuration typically including userportable terminals 102 a, 102 b, and so on, an information searchingapparatus 104, a communication network 112 as well as apreference-information management server 114. In this embodiment, inorder to effectively provide a user registered as a member in advancewith commodity/service information as information showing member'spreference, the information searching apparatus 104 according to theembodiment gathers the information on every commodity/service, which isthe member's interest.

The user portable terminals 102 a, 102 b, and so on are each aninformation terminal used for storing a user identifier for uniquelyidentifying the user making use of the preference-information gatheringsystem 100. The user portable terminals 102 a, 102 b, and so on are eachreferred to hereafter simply as a user portable terminal 102 in thefollowings. The user portable terminal 102 of a user is capable ofdriving the information searching apparatus 104 to be described later torecognize the user identifier in the process carried out by the user tosearch for information on every commodity/service. The user identifieris typically a user ID assigned to the user in a process to register theuser as a member. It is desirable to provide a user portable terminal102 that has such a size and such a weight that the user portableterminal 102 can be carried by the user with ease. Examples of the userportable terminal 102 are a magnetic card, an IC card, a mobiletelephone, a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant), a watch having anembedded IC chip, and an accessory including such a chip.

In addition to the user identifier, the user portable terminal 102 isalso used for storing search information. Thus, the user portableterminal 102 has a configuration not only capable of driving theinformation searching apparatus 104 to recognize the user identifier,but also capable of transmitting search information stored therein tothe information searching apparatus 104. To put it concretely, forexample, the user portable terminal 102 is either of a mobile telephone,a PDA, and the like, which each have an input function. In this case,the user enters a keyword or the like in advance as search informationto the user portable terminal 102 to be stored in a memory employed inthe user portable terminal 102. Then, the user can operate the userportable terminal 102 to transmit the search information to theinformation searching apparatus 104 by a radio or an infraredcommunication.

It is to be noted that, if the user memorizes the identifier of its own,the user portable terminal 102 can be removed from the system.

The information searching apparatus 104 is connected to thepreference-information management server 114 for managing user'spreference by the communication network 112. The information searchingapparatus 104 is an information processing apparatus capable ofproviding information to be reflected in user's preference information.The information searching apparatus 104 has a configuration typicallyincluding a search-result outputting unit 106, a search-informationinputting unit 108, and a user-identifier acquisition unit 110.

The search-information inputting unit 108 is an input unit capable ofreceiving and selecting search information to be used for obtaininginformation on every commodity/service, which is desired by the user.Typically, the search-information inputting unit 108 includes akeyboard, a mouse, and a touch panel. In addition, thesearch-information inputting unit 108 may have a configuration allowingthe user to enter a voice input to the search-information inputting unit108. The search information is typically a search key used by theinformation searching apparatus 104 in a process to search forinformation on every commodity/service, which are each desired by theuser. If the user wants to obtain information on a movie desired by theuser, for example, the search information can be the title and/or genreof the movie or the names of an actor and/or actress of the movie.

In a system where the user transmits search information from the userportable terminal 102 to the information searching apparatus 104, thesearch-information inputting unit 108 is provided with a function forreceiving the search information by a radio or infrared communication.

The user-identifier acquisition unit 110 is a unit for acquiring theuser identifier from a user portable terminal 102. To put it concretely,the user-identifier acquisition unit 110 reads out the user identifierfrom a magnetic card, receives the user identifier from an IC card, awatch having an IC chip embedded therein, an accessory including such achip, or a mobile telephone by a radio communication, or receives theuser identifier from a mobile telephone by an infrared communication. Asan alternative, the user-identifier acquisition unit 110 may request theuser to directly enter the user identifier via a keyboard or a touchpanel.

The search-result outputting unit 106 is a unit for displayinginformation obtained as a result of a search process requested by theuser. To put it concretely, when the search-result outputting unit 106receives the title of a movie from the search-information inputting unit108, for example, the search-result outputting unit 106 displays, amongothers, an outline of the movie, information on performers of the movie,and a location of video information representing the movie on a displayscreen. In addition to the display screen, the search-result outputtingunit 106 may also have an audio output sub-unit in a configurationallowing the movie obtained as a result of a search process to bedisplayed on a trial basis or a piece of music also obtained as a resultof a search process to be heard by the user also on a trial basis.

The information searching apparatus 104 transmits a user identifieracquired by the user-identifier acquisition unit 110 and a result of asearch process requested by the user identifier to thepreference-information management server 114 by way of the communicationnetwork 112 by associating the identifier with the result of the search.A detailed configuration of the information searching apparatus 104 willbe described later.

The communication network 112 is a network having a function to transmitinformation typically including the user identifier and the result of asearch process. Examples of the communication network 112 are atelephone line, a dedicated line, and the Internet, which are capable ofcarrying out communications in two directions. The communication network112 can be a wire-communication or a radio-communication network.

The preference-information management server 114 is an informationprocessing apparatus for managing user's preference informationutilizing the preference-information gathering system 100. Thepreference-information management server 114 receives a user identifierand a search process-result, which are transmitted by the informationsearching apparatus 104 through the communication network 112, andmanages the result of the search process as information, which isinferred to be information of interest to the user.

In accordance with the preference-information gathering system 100having the configuration described above, the preference-informationmanagement server 114 is capable of managing information, which isobtained as a result of a search process carried out by the informationsearching apparatus 104 at a request made by the user ascommodity/service information, as user's preference information. Thus,the preference-information management server 114 is also capable ofgathering information of interest to the user as user's preferenceinformation. As a result, the user can obtain information on eachcommodity and/or each service, which have been searched for by the userby using the information searching apparatus 104, from acommodity/service providing company or the like.

The entire configuration of the preference-information gathering system100 has been described so far. Next, the functional configurations ofthe information searching apparatus 104 and the preference-informationmanagement server 114 are explained by referring to FIG. 2.

First of all, the hardware configurations of the information searchingapparatus 104 and the preference-information management server 114 aredescribed briefly. Typically, the information searching apparatus 104and the preference-information management server 114 each have a CPU, aROM, a RAM, and a hard disk.

The CPU is a section functioning as a processing unit as well as acontrol unit, which are capable of controlling processes carried out byother components employed in the information searching apparatus 104 orthe preference-information management server 114. The ROM and the RAMare memories for temporarily storing information such as data related toprocessing carried out by the CPU and a program executed by the CPU.

The hard disk is configured typically as a hard-disk drive or a flashmemory to serve as a storage unit used for storing information includingan OS (Operating System) and a variety of application programs. The harddisk has a configuration typically including acommodity/service-information storage unit 122 and apreference-information storage unit 130, which are to be describedlater. It is to be noted that each of the commodity/service-informationstorage unit 122, the preference-information storage unit 130, and othermemory portions can also be implemented as a ROM and/or a RAM instead ofa portion of the hard disk.

Next, the functional configurations of the information searchingapparatus 104 and the preference-information management server 114 areexplained. The information searching apparatus 104 has a configurationtypically including the user-identifier acquisition unit 110, thesearch-information inputting unit 108, the search-result outputting unit106, a search-result acquisition unit 120, thecommodity/service-information storage unit 122, and a search-resultsender unit 124.

As described above, the user-identifier acquisition unit 110 functionsas a unit for acquiring the user identifier from a user portableterminal 102. The user-identifier acquisition unit 110 passes on theacquired user identifier to the search-result sender unit 124. Asexplained earlier, the search-information inputting unit 108 functionsas a unit for requesting the user to enter search information. Asdescribed before, the search-result outputting unit 106 functions as aunit for displaying a result of a search process or outputting theresult as an audio signal in order to present the result to the user.

The commodity/service-information storage unit 122 functions as a unitfor storing information on every commodity/service, which is presentableto the user. The commodity/service information is typically informationprovided by a commodity/service providing company, which uses thepreference-information gathering system 100 to gather user's preferenceinformation. If a commodity provided by the commodity/service providingcompany is a rental video, the contents of the information on thecommodity are the location offering the rental video, an overview of thevideo, and pictures obtained as a result of trial reproduction of thevideo.

The search-result acquisition unit 120 functions as a unit for searchingthe commodity/service-information storage unit 122 for information on acommodity/service corresponding to a search key entered to thesearch-information inputting unit 108 and supplying the informationobtained as a result of the search process to the search-result senderunit 124. In addition, the search-result acquisition unit 120 alsofunctions as a unit for supplying the information obtained as a resultof the search process to the search-result outputting unit 106 to bepresented to the user. To put it concretely, let us assume for examplethat the search-result acquisition unit 120 receives the title of amovie from the search-information inputting unit. In this case, thesearch-result acquisition unit 120 searches thecommodity/service-information storage unit for a video contentrepresenting the movie and supplies the video content to thesearch-result outputting unit 106 as a result of the search process tobe presented to the user. At that time, the search-result acquisitionunit 120 supplies the title of the movie to the search-result senderunit 124. In place of the title of the movie, the search-resultacquisition unit 120 may supply the genre to which the movie pertains tothe search-result sender unit 124.

In addition, if the search-result acquisition unit 120 searches thecommodity/service-information storage unit 122 for information on acommodity/service corresponding to a search key entered to thesearch-information inputting unit 108 but fails to obtain theinformation as a result of the search process, the search-resultacquisition unit 120 may pass on the search key itself to thesearch-result sender unit 124. With this configuration, if informationhas not been stored in the commodity/service-information storage unit122 as information on a commodity/service desired by the user, thesearch key entered by the user can be transmitted to thepreference-information management server 114 as information on acommodity/service of interest to the user.

The search-result sender unit 124 functions as a unit for transmitting auser identifier received from the user-identifier acquisition unit 110and a search-process result received from the search-result acquisitionunit 120 to the preference-information management server 114 byassociating the user identifier and the search-process result with eachother.

The preference-information management server 114 has a configurationtypically including a search-result receiver unit 126, apreference-information updating unit 128, and a preference-informationstorage unit 130. The search-result receiver unit 126 functions as aunit for receiving a search-process result transmitted by theinformation searching apparatus 104 by way of the communication network112.

The preference-information updating unit 128 functions as a unit forupdating information stored in the preference-information storage unit130 as user's preference information on the basis of a search-processresult received by the search-result receiver unit 126. Thepreference-information storage unit 130 functions as a memory used forstoring user's preference information. The preference-informationstorage unit 130 is explained in detail by referring to FIGS. 3 and 4 asfollows.

As shown in FIG. 3, the preference-information storage unit 130 is usedfor storing the identifiers of users and pieces of user's preferenceinformation by associating each of the identifiers with one of thepieces of information. To put it concretely, the user IDs of users eachregistered as a member are put in advance on a user-identifier column132. On the other hand, search-process results received by thesearch-result receiver unit 126 from the information searching apparatus104 are put by associating each specific one of the results with thereceived user identifier along with the specific result. That is to say,the preference-information storage unit 130 is used for storingcommodity/service information for each of the user identifier. Thestored commodity/service information is information obtained as a resultof a search process carried out in the information searching apparatus104 at a request made by a user identified by the user identifierassociated with the information. In other words, for each of the useridentifier, the preference-information storage unit 130 is used forstoring information on every commodity/service, which is probably theuser's interest.

As described above, information stored in the preference-informationstorage unit 130 is updated by the preference-information updating unit128. Let us assume for example that, ‘Star Wall’ is received by thesearch-result receiver unit 126 from the information searching apparatus104 as a search-process result representing information on a commodityand/or a service along with a user identifier of ‘00003’, as shown in anexample of FIG. 3. In this case, the search-process result of ‘StarWall’ is added to the preference-information column 134 by being put ona row corresponding to the user identifier of ‘00003’ as shown in thefigure.

As shown in the example of FIG. 3, the information stored in thepreference-information storage unit 130 as user's preference informationis unmodified search-process results each representing commodity/serviceinformation. In place of the commodity/service information, thepreference-information storage unit 130 can also be used for storingkeywords including results of search processes. As shown in an exampleof FIG. 4, the keyword is typically the genre of a commodity and/or aservice, which have been found in a search process. To put itconcretely, in place of the title of a movie found in a search process,for example, the genre of the movie is added to a preference-informationcolumn 144, being associated with the user-identifier column 132 asshown in FIG. 4. In addition, a search-process result received by thesearch-result receiver unit 126 from the information searching apparatus104 can be the title of a movie found in a search process as shown inFIG. 3 or the genre of the movie as shown in FIG. 4.

So far, the functional configurations of the information searchingapparatus 104 and the preference-information management server 114 havebeen described. Next, processing carried out in thepreference-information gathering system 100 according to the embodimentto gather user's preference information is explained by referring to aflowchart shown in FIG. 5.

The flowchart begins with a step S102 at which the information searchingapparatus 104 stores commodity/service information as information thatcan be presented to the user (S102). In addition, at a step S104, thepreference-information management server 114 stores user's preferenceinformation (S104). To put it concretely, for example, when the user isregistered as a member, initial user's preference are inferred fromanswers each given by the user as a response to a questionnaire or thelike and stored in the preference-information storage unit 130.

Then, the user operates the user portable terminal 102 to transmit theuser identifier to the information searching apparatus 104 (S106).Subsequently, the user enters search information to the informationsearching apparatus 104 in a process to search for information onpredetermined commodities and/or predetermined services (S108).

Then, the information searching apparatus 104 searches thecommodity/service-information storage unit 122 on the basis of theentered search information in order to acquire the informationcorresponding to the search information (S110). Subsequently, theinformation searching apparatus 104 outputs the acquired information asa result of the search process in order to present the information tothe user (S112). Then, the user is capable of obtaining the informationon predetermined commodities and/or predetermined services as the resultof the search process (S114).

In addition, at a step S116, the information searching apparatus 104transmits the user identifier and the result of the search process tothe preference-information management server 114 by associating the useridentifier and the result of the search process (S116) with each other.Subsequently, the preference-information management server 114 receivesthe user identifier and the result of the search process (S118). Then,the preference-information management server 114 updates the user'spreference information identified by the received user identifier on thebasis of the received result of the search process (S120).

The above description has explained the flowchart representing theprocessing carried out by the preference-information gathering system100 to gather user's preference information.

By providing the preference-information gathering system 100 accordingto the first embodiment with the configuration described above, thepreference-information management server 114 is capable of managinginformation, which is found as information on commodities/servicesdesired by a user in a search process carried out by the informationsearching apparatus 104 at a request made by the user, as user'spreference information. That is to say, information on everycommodity/service, which is the user's interest even though probably notto be purchased by the user, can be collected as user's preferenceinformation.

Second Embodiment

The following description explains a second embodiment implementing apreference-information gathering system 200 in which information usedfor recognizing every commodity/service, which is the user's interest,is accumulated in a user portable terminal owned by the user and theaccumulated information is then transmitted to a preference-informationmanagement server in order to gather user's preference information.

First of all, the entire configuration of the preference-informationgathering system 200 according to this embodiment is explained byreferring to FIG. 6. As shown in the figure, the preference-informationgathering system 200 has a configuration typically includingcommodity/service recognition tags 201 a, 201 b, and so on, a userportable terminal 202, a communication network 212 as well as apreference-information management apparatus 214. In this embodiment, inorder to effectively provide a user registered in advance as a memberwith commodity/service information as information showing member'spreference, the commodity/service recognition tags 201 a, 201 b, and soon as well as the user portable terminal 202, which are provided by theembodiment, are used for gathering information on everycommodity/service, which are each of interest to the user.

The commodity/service recognition tags 201 a, 201 b, and so on are eachused for recording a commodity/service identifier used by thepreference-information management apparatus 214 to be described laterfor uniquely identifying a commodity and/or a service. In the followingdescription, the commodity/service recognition tags 201 a, 201 b, and soon are each referred to simply as a commodity/service tag 201. Examplesof the commodity/service tag 201 are a two-dimensional barcode, an ICtag, and a magnetic card.

The user portable terminal 202 is an information terminal used forstoring an identifier for uniquely identifying the user making use ofthe preference-information gathering system 200. The user portableterminal 202 is an information terminal capable of reading out thecommodity/service identifier from the commodity/service tag 201 andcapable of transmitting the commodity/service identifier along with theuser identifier to the preference-information management apparatus 214by way of the communication network 112 by associating thecommodity/service identifier and the user identifier with each other.The user identifier is typically a user ID assigned to the user in aprocess to register the user as a member. It is desirable to provide auser portable terminal 202 that has such a size and such a weight thatthe user portable terminal 202 can be carried by the user with ease.Examples of the user portable terminal 202 are a mobile telephone, a PDA(Personal Digital Assistant).

The user portable terminal 202 functions as a unit for reading out thecommodity/service identifier from a commodity/service tag 201. Let usassume for example that the commodity/service tag 201 is atwo-dimensional barcode. In this case, the user portable terminal 202has the function of a barcode reader. If the commodity/service tag 201is an IC tag, the commodity/service tag 201 has the function of anIC-tag reader. In addition, the user portable terminal 202 may haveanother function suitable for the type of the commodity/service tag 201.Examples of the other function are the function of a magnetic-cardreader, an infrared communication function, and a radio communicationfunction.

If the commodity/service tag is a two-dimensional barcode, the user iscapable of reading out the barcode by using the user portable terminal202 even if the barcode is displayed on the screen of a PC (PersonalComputer). Thus, the user is capable of reading out commodity/serviceidentifiers of commodities actually lined up in a store or the like fromthe commodity/service identification tags 201 each attached to one ofthe commodities by using the user portable terminal 202. In addition,while the user is viewing a web content displayed typically on thescreen of a PC at the home of the user, for example, the user is alsocapable of reading out the commodity/service identifiers of a commodityand/or a service, which are of interest to the user, from thecommodity/service identification tags 201 each displayed on the PC asthe commodity/service identification tag 201 of each of the commodityand/or the service by associating the commodity/service identificationtag 201 with the commodity and/or the service by using the user portableterminal 202.

It is to be noted that the user portable terminal 202 is also capable ofsaving each commodity/service identifier read out from thecommodity/service tag 201 in a memory and later collectivelytransmitting a plurality of such identifiers stored in the memory to thepreference-information management server 214. If the user portableterminal 202 is capable of transmitting a plurality of commodity/serviceidentifiers to the preference-information management server 214 at onetime, the transmission cost can be reduced to a small one in comparisonwith a case in which a commodity/service identifier is transmitted tothe preference-information management server 214 every time theidentifier is read out from a commodity/service tag 201.

The communication network 212 is a network having a function to transmitthe user identifier and the commodity/service identifier. Examples ofthe communication network 212 are a telephone line, a dedicated line,and the Internet, which are capable of carrying out communications intwo directions. The communication network 212 can be awire-communication or a radio-communication network.

The preference-information management apparatus 214 is an informationprocessing apparatus for managing user's preference informationutilizing the preference-information gathering system 200. Thepreference-information management apparatus 214 receives a useridentifier and a commodity/service identifier, which are transmitted bythe user portable terminal 202 by way of the communication network 212.The preference-information management apparatus 214 manages thecommodity/service identifiers as information inferred to be possibleinformation of interest to users each identified by a received useridentifier.

In the configuration described above, the user utilizes the userportable terminal 202 to read out the commodity/service identifier froma commodity/service tag 201 attached to either of the commodity or theservice, which are of interest to the user, and transmit the identifierof its own along with the identifier of the commodity or the servicefrom the user portable terminal 202 to the preference-informationmanagement apparatus 214. The preference-information managementapparatus 214 handles the commodity/service identified by thecommodity/service identifier as a commodity/service of interest to theuser identified by a user identifier received along with thecommodity/service identifier, and manages the commodity and/or theservice as user's preference. As a result, the user can receiveinformation on a commodity/service identified by a commodity/serviceidentifier transmitted to the preference-information managementapparatus 214 from a commodity/service providing company or the like.

The entire configuration of the preference-information gathering system200 has been explained above. Next, the functional configurations of theuser portable terminal 202 and the preference-information managementserver 214 are described by referring to FIG. 7 as follows.

First of all, the hardware configurations of the user portable terminal202 and the preference-information management server 214 are describedbriefly. Since the hardware configuration of the preference-informationmanagement server 214 is all but the same as that of the correspondingone according to the first embodiment, no explanation of the hardwareconfiguration of the preference-information management server 214 isgiven. Typically, the user portable terminal 202 has a CPU, a ROM, aRAM, and a hard disk.

The CPU is a section functioning as a processing unit as well as acontrol unit, which are capable of controlling processes carried out byother components employed in the user portable terminal 202. The ROM andthe RAM are memories for temporarily storing information such as datarelated to processing carried out by the CPU and a program executed bythe CPU.

The hard disk is configured typically as a hard-disk drive or a flashmemory to serve as a storage unit used for storing information includingan OS (Operating System) and a variety of application programs. The harddisk has a configuration typically including acommodity/service-identifier storage unit 222 and a user-identifierstorage unit 223, which will be described later. It is to be noted thateach of the commodity/service-identifier storage unit 222, theuser-identifier storage unit 223, and other memory portions can also beimplemented as a ROM and/or a RAM instead of a portion of the hard disk.

If the user portable terminal 202 is a mobile telephone having IC chipsor the like, an EEPROM is employed. In this case, thecommodity/service-identifier storage unit 222 and the user-identifierstorage unit 223 can be included in the EEPROM.

Next, the functional configurations of the user portable terminal 202and the preference-information management server 214 are explained. Theuser portable terminal 202 has a configuration typically including acommodity/service-identifier inputting unit 220, thecommodity/service-identifier storage unit 222, the user-identifierstorage unit 223, and a commodity/service-information sender unit 224.

The commodity/service-identifier inputting unit 220 functions as a unitfor acquiring the commodity/service identifiers from commodity/servicetags 201 and transmitting the acquired identifiers to thecommodity/service-information sender unit 224 as described above. Inaddition, the commodity/service-identifier inputting unit 220 is alsocapable of saving the acquired commodity/service identifiers in thecommodity/service-identifier storage unit 222. If the commodity/servicetag 201 is a tag showing the commodity/service identifier as anidentifier that can be recognized by the user in place of atwo-dimensional bar code or an IC tag as described above, the user mayenter the commodity/service identifier to the user portable terminal 202via typically input means employed in the user portable terminal 202.Examples of the input means are a keyboard and a touch panel.

The commodity/service-identifier storage unit 222 functions as a memoryused for storing identifiers acquired by thecommodity/service-identifier inputting unit 220 as the commodity/serviceidentifiers. On the other hand, the user-identifier storage unit 223functions as a memory used for storing user identifiers each used foruniquely identifying a user in the preference-information gatheringsystem 200.

The commodity/service-information sender unit 224 functions as a unitfor transmitting a commodity/service identifier received from thecommodity/service-identifier inputting unit 220 or read out from thecommodity/service-identifier storage unit 222 and a user identifierstored in the user-identifier storage unit 223 to thepreference-information management apparatus 214 by associating thecommodity/service identifier with the user identifier. It is to be notedthat the commodity/service-information sender unit 224 can also beconfigured to be capable of selecting the identifier of a desiredcommodity or a desired service from commodity/service identifiers storedin the commodity/service-identifier storage unit and transmitting theselected identifier to the preference-information management apparatus214.

The preference-information management apparatus 214 has a configurationincluding a commodity/service-information receiver unit 226, anidentifier/information storage unit 227, a preference-informationupdating unit 228, and a preference-information storage unit 230. Thecommodity/service-information receiver unit 226 functions as a unit forreceiving information transmitted by the user portable terminal 202 byway of the communication network 112 as commodity/service information.

The preference-information updating unit 228 functions as a unit forupdating information stored in the preference-information storage unit230 as user's preference information on the basis of informationreceived by the commodity/service-information receiver unit ascommodity/service information. The identifier/information storage unit227 functions as a memory used for storing commodity/service identifiersas well as storing information as information on everycommodity/service, which are each identified by the identifiers. Thepreference-information storage unit 230 functions as a memory used forstoring user's preference information. The preference-informationstorage unit 230 and the identifier/information storage unit 227 areexplained in detail by referring to FIGS. 8 and 9 as follows.

FIG. 8 is an explanatory diagram showing typical information stored inthe preference-information storage unit 230. As shown in the figure, thepreference-information storage unit 230 is used for storing theidentifiers of users and pieces of user's preference information byassociating each of the identifiers with one of the pieces ofinformation. To put it concretely, the user IDs of users each registeredas a member are put in advance on a user-identifier column 232. On apreference-information column 234, for each of the user identifier,commodity/service identifiers are recorded by associating thecommodity/service identifiers with the user identifier received by thecommodity/service-information receiver unit 226 from the user portableterminal 202 along with the commodity/service identifiers. That is tosay, for each of the user identifier, the preference-information storageunit 230 is used for storing commodity/service identifiers each read outfrom a commodity/service tag 201 by using the user portable terminal 202operated by a user identified by the user identifier and transmitted tothe preference-information management apparatus 214. In other words, thecommodity/service identifiers stored in the preference-informationstorage unit 230 are the identifiers of every commodity/service, whichare each probably of interest to a user identified by the useridentifier.

As described above, information stored in the preference-informationstorage unit 230 is updated by the preference-information updating unit228. Let us assume for example that, a commodity/service identifier ofSW25533 is received by the commodity/service-information receiver unit226 from the user portable terminal 202 along with a user identifier of00002 as shown in an example of FIG. 8. In this case, thecommodity/service identifier of SW25533 is added to thepreference-information column 234 by being put on a row corresponding tothe user identifier of ‘00002’ as shown in the figure.

In addition, in a process to store the commodity/service identifier inthe preference-information storage unit 230, the identifier may beconverted into information on the commodity or service identified by theidentifier as shown in an example of FIG. 9. In accordance with theexample shown in FIG. 9, information on the commodity or serviceidentified by a commodity/service identifier transmitted by the userfrom the user portable terminal 202 to the preference-informationmanagement apparatus 214 is stored in the preference-information column244 by being put on a row corresponding to a user identifier 232transmitted along with the commodity/service identifier. Theidentifier/information storage unit 227 has acommodity/service-identifier column 250 for storing thecommodity/service identifiers and a commodity/service-category column252 used for storing pieces of information on a commodity or serviceidentified by one of the identifiers.

After receiving the commodity/service identifier from the user portableterminal 202, the commodity/service-information receiver unit 226 refersto the identifier/information storage unit 227 in order to convert theidentifier into information on the commodity or the service and, then,supplies the information to the preference-information updating unit228. In the case of the example shown in FIG. 9, thecommodity/service-information receiver unit 226 receives a useridentifier of 00002 along with a commodity/service identifier of SW25533from the user portable terminal 202. As shown in the figure, thecommodity/service-information receiver unit 226 then acquirescommodity/service information, which is a sweeter (white), from thecommodity/service-category column 252 as information corresponding tothe commodity/service identifier of SW25533. Subsequently, thecommodity/service-information receiver unit 226 adds the acquiredinformation on the commodity to the preference-information column 244 bybeing put on a row corresponding to the user identifier of 00002.

The functional configurations of the user portable terminal 202 and thepreference-information management apparatus 214 have been describedabove. By referring to a flowchart shown in FIG. 10, the followingdescription explains processing carried out in thepreference-information gathering system 200 according to the embodimentto gather user's preference information.

The flowchart begins with a step S202 at which thepreference-information management apparatus 214 stores user's preferenceinformation (S202). To put it concretely, for example, when a user isregistered as a member, initial user's preference are inferred fromanswers each given by the user as a response to a questionnaire or thelike and stored in the preference-information storage unit 230.

Then, at a step S204, the user operates the user portable terminal 202in order to acquire the commodity/service identifier from acommodity/service tag 201 (S204). Subsequently, at the next step S206,the acquired commodity/service identifier is stored in thecommodity/service-identifier storage unit 222 (S206). Then, at the stepS208, the user portable terminal 202 transmits stored commodity/serviceidentifiers to the preference-information management apparatus 214 alongwith the user identifier (S208). It is to be noted that the user mayoperate the user portable terminal 202 in order to select the identifierof a desired commodity or a desired service from the storedcommodity/service identifiers and transmit the identifier of the desiredcommodity or the desired service to the preference-informationmanagement apparatus 214 along with the user identifier. As analternative, after the user operates the user portable terminal 202 inorder to acquire the commodity/service identifier at the step S204, theidentifier is transmitted to the preference-information managementapparatus 214 automatically along with the user identifier.

The preference-information management apparatus 214 receivescommodity/service identifiers and the user identifier from the userportable terminal 202 (S210). Then, the preference-informationmanagement apparatus 214 updates information, which is associated withthe received user identifier as user's preference information, on thebasis of the received commodity/service identifiers (S212).

The above description has explained the flowchart representing theprocessing carried out in the preference-information gathering system200 to gather user's preference information.

By configuring the preference-information gathering system 200 accordingto the second embodiment as described above, the preference-informationmanagement apparatus 214 can be used for managing commodity/serviceidentifiers, which are acquired by the user portable terminal 202operated by the user from commodity/service recognition tags 201, asuser's preference information. That is to say, information on everycommodity/service, which is the user's interest even though probably notto be purchased by the user, can be collected as user's preferenceinformation.

Third Embodiment

The following description explains a third embodiment implementing apreference-information gathering system 300 capable of gathering user'spreference information by transmitting information on places or the likefrequently passed through or visited by the user to apreference-information management server 314.

First of all, the entire configuration of the preference-informationgathering system 300 according to this embodiment is explained byreferring to FIG. 11. As shown in the figure, the preference-informationgathering system 300 has a configuration typically including a userportable terminal 302, passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 a,304 b, and so on, a communication network 312 as well as apreference-information management server 314. In this embodiment, inorder to effectively provide a user registered in advance as a memberwith commodity/service information as information showing member'spreference, the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 a, 304 b,and so on as well as the user portable terminal 302, which are providedby the embodiment, are used for gathering information on places or thelike passed through or visited by the user frequently.

The user portable terminal 302 is an information terminal used forstoring an identifier for uniquely identifying the user making use ofthe preference-information gathering system 300. The user portableterminal 302 is capable of driving each of the passed-place-informationsender apparatus 304 a, 304 b, and so on, which will be described later,to recognize the user identifier. The user identifier is typically auser ID assigned to the user in a process to register the user as amember. It is desirable to provide a user portable terminal 302 that hassuch a size and such a weight that the user portable terminal 302 can becarried by the user with ease. Examples of the user portable terminal302 are a magnetic card, an IC card, a mobile telephone, a PDA (PersonalDigital Assistant), a watch having an IC chip embedded therein, and anaccessory including such a chip. In particular, if the user portableterminal 302 is a terminal capable of carrying out non-contactcommunications with the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 a,304 b, and so on in order to transmit the user identifier to thepassed-place-information sender apparatus 304 a, 304 b, and so on, sucha user portable terminal 302 is convenient for the user in that the userneeds only to hold the user portable terminal 302 over a location inclose proximity to any of the passed-place-information sender apparatus304 a, 304 b, and so on. Examples of such a user portable terminal 302are an IC card, a mobile telephone having IC chips embedded therein, awatch including such chips, and an accessory including such chips. It isto be noted that the non-contact communication is a communication inwhich the user portable terminal 302 is not brought into physicalcontact with the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 a, 304 b,and so on. Even if the user portable terminal 302 is brought intophysical contact with the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304a, 304 b, and so on, the user portable terminal 302 is not brought intoelectrical contact with the passed-place-information sender apparatus304 a, 304 b, and so on. Thus, the non-contact communication is a radiocommunication. It is desirable to mainly carry out a non-contactcommunication only within a narrow range of the order of about 10 cm inconformity with NFC (Near Field Communication) standards specifying anRF carrier frequency of 13.56 MHz and a maximum communication speed of212 Kbps.

The passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 a, 304 b, and so on,which are each referred to hereafter simply as apassed-place-information sender apparatus 304, are connected to thepreference-information management server 314, which is a server formanaging user's preference information, by the communication network312. The user portable terminal 302 is an information processingapparatus capable of providing the preference-information managementserver 314 with information to be reflected in the user's preferenceinformation. To put it concretely, the passed-place-information senderapparatus 304 is incorporated as a part of an automatic ticket gate of astation, an entrance door of a store, or the like as shown in thefigure. As an alternative, the passed-place-information sender apparatus304 is installed for example at a children's clothing section of adepartment store or at the entrance of a special-commodity sales sectionof a store. By placing the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304at such a place, the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 iscapable of acquiring the user identifier from the user portable terminal302 when the user passes through or visits the place and notifying thepreference-information management apparatus 214 that the user has passedthrough or visited the place. The passed-place-information senderapparatus 304 employs user-identifier acquisition units 310 a, 310 b,and so on.

The user-identifier acquisition units 310 a, 310 b, and so on, which areeach referred to hereafter simply as a user-identifier acquisition unit310, are each a unit for acquiring the user identifier from the userportable terminal 302. To put it concretely, for example, theuser-identifier acquisition unit 310 reads out the user identifier froma magnetic card. As an alternative, the user-identifier acquisition unit310 receives a user identifier transmitted by either of an IC card, awatch including an IC chip embedded therein, an accessory, a portablephone, and the like, through a radio communication. As anotheralternative, the user-identifier acquisition unit 310 receives a useridentifier transmitted by a mobile telephone or the like, through aninfrared communication.

The communication network 312 is a network having a function to transmita user identifier or the like used in the embodiment. Examples of thecommunication network 312 include the Internet. The communicationnetwork 312 can be a wire-communication or a radio-communicationnetwork.

The preference-information management server 314 is an informationprocessing apparatus managing user's preference information making useof the preference-information gathering system 300. Thepreference-information management server 314 receives informationtransmitted by the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 by wayof the communication network 312. The information typically includes auser identifier and an apparatus identifier identifying thepassed-place-information sender apparatus 304. Thepreference-information management server 314 regards a place used forinstalling the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 identifiedby an apparatus identifier as a place passed through or visited by auser identified by a user identifier, and manages information on suchplaces as user's preference information. In addition, thepreference-information management server 314 also regards everycommodity/service, which are each relevant to a place for installing apassed-place-information sender apparatus 304, respectively as acommodity and/or a service, which are of interest to a user, and managesinformation on such commodities/services as user's preferenceinformation.

It is to be noted that information on every place passed through orvisited by a user is not immediately managed as user's preferenceinformation. Instead, for a user identifier, the preference-informationmanagement server 314 is typically provided with a counter for countingthe number of times the same apparatus identifier are received by thepreference-information management server 314 along with the useridentifier. Then, the preference-information management server 314manages information identified by an apparatus identifier as user'spreference information only if the value of a counter provided for theuser identifier indicates that the number of times the apparatusidentifier have been received along with the user identifier is greaterthan a predetermined value. By providing the configuration describedabove, it is possible to manage information on only places each passedthrough and/or visited by a user as well as only everycommodity/service, which are relevant to the place, as user's preferenceinformation. Thus, user's preference can be inferred more properly.

By virtue of the configuration described above, the user can request thepassed-place-information sender apparatus 304 to recognize a useridentifier stored in the user portable terminal 302 and transmit theuser identifier recognized by the passed-place-information senderapparatus 304 to the preference-information management server 314 alongwith the identifier of the passed-place-information sender apparatus304. Thus, the preference-information management server 314 is capableof managing a place used for installing the passed-place-informationsender apparatus 304 identified by the apparatus identifier as a placefrequently passed through or visited by a user identified by a useridentifier. In addition, the preference-information management server314 is capable of regarding information on every commodity/service,which are each relevant to the place, as respectively a commodity and/ora service, which are of interest to a user, and managing information onsuch commodities/services as user's preference information. As a result,the user can receive the information about the place where the userpasses through or visits frequently and the information about thecommodities and services related to the place.

The entire configuration of the preference-information gathering system300 has been described above. Next, by referring to FIG. 12, thefollowing description explains the functional configurations of the userportable terminal 302, the passed-place-information sender apparatus304, and the preference-information management server 314. It is to benoted that, since the hardware configurations of the first and thesecond embodiment are the same, no explanation of the hardwareconfigurations of the second embodiment is given.

The user portable terminal 302 has a configuration typically including auser-identifier storage unit 318 and a user-identifier sender unit 320.The user-identifier storage unit 318 functions as a memory used forstoring a user identifier uniquely identifying a user in thepreference-information gathering system 300. The user-identifier senderunit 320 functions as a unit for acquiring the user identifier from theuser-identifier storage unit 318 and transmitting the identifier to thepassed-place-information sender apparatus 304.

The passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 has a configurationtypically including a user-identifier acquisition unit 310, anidentifier-transmission determining unit 322, an apparatus-identifierstorage unit 323, and a passed-place-information sender apparatus 324.

The user-identifier acquisition unit 310 functions as a unit forreceiving the user identifier transmitted by the user portable terminal302 as described above. The user-identifier acquisition unit 310 passeson the received user identifier to the identifier-transmissiondetermining unit 322 or the passed-place-information sender apparatus324.

The identifier-transmission determining unit 322 functions as a unit forexamining the user identifier received from the user-identifieracquisition unit 310 in order to produce a result of determination as towhether or not to transmit the user identifier to thepreference-information management server 314. Theidentifier-transmission determining unit 322 passes on the useridentifier to the passed-place-information sender apparatus 324 only ifthe result of the determination indicates that the user identifier is anidentifier to be transmitted to the preference-information managementserver 314. To put it concretely, when a user is registered as a member,for example, the user is typically requested to confirm that informationon a place passed through or visited by the user can be gathered. Then,the confirmation result indicating whether or not the information on theplace can be transmitted is stored in a memory in advance along with theuser identifier. Thus, the result of the confirmation can be used in aprocess to produce a result of determination as to whether or not totransmit the user identifier to the preference-information managementserver 314.

The apparatus-identifier storage unit 323 functions as a memory used forstoring an apparatus identifier uniquely identifying thepassed-place-information sender apparatus in the preference-informationgathering system 300.

The passed-place-information sender apparatus 324 functions as a unitfor transmitting a user identifier received from the user-identifieracquisition unit 310 or the identifier-transmission determining unit 322and the apparatus identifier read out from the apparatus-identifierstorage unit 323 to the preference-information management server 314 byassociating the user identifier with the apparatus identifier with eachother.

The preference-information management server 314 has a configurationtypically including a passed-place-information receiver apparatus 326, aplace-information storage unit 327, a preference-information updatingunit 328, and a preference-information storage unit 330. Thepassed-place-information receiver apparatus 326 functions as a unit forreceiving a user identifier and an apparatus identifier, which aretransmitted by the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 by wayof the communication network 312.

The preference-information updating unit 328 functions as a unit forusing a user identifier and an apparatus identifier, which are receivedby the passed-place-information receiver apparatus 326, to updateinformation stored in the preference-information storage unit 330 asuser's preference information. For each apparatus identifier, theplace-information storage unit 327 is used for storing information on aplace for installing a passed-place-information sender apparatus 304identified by the identifier or information on every commodity/service,which are relevant to the place or the passed-place-information senderapparatus 304, by associating the information with the identifier. Thepreference-information storage unit 330 functions as a memory used forstoring information on every user's preference. Thepreference-information storage unit 330 is explained in detail byreferring to FIGS. 13 and 4.

As shown in FIG. 13, the preference-information storage unit 330 is usedfor storing user's preference information by associating the informationwith the user identifier. To put it concretely, a user-identifier column332 is used for storing each user ID identifying a user registered as amember in advance. A preference-information column 334 is used forstoring information related to an apparatus identifier received by thepassed-place-information receiver unit 326 from thepassed-place-information sender apparatus 304 by associating theinformation with the user identifier transmitted by thepassed-place-information sender apparatus 304. That is to say, for eachuser identifier, the preference-information storage unit 330 is used forstoring information related to a passed-place-information senderapparatus 304 installed at a place passed through or visited frequentlyby a user identified by a user identifier. In other words, thepreference-information storage unit 330 is used for storing informationinferred to be probably information of interest to the user.

An apparatus-information storage unit 340 has an identifier column 342used for storing apparatus identifiers each identifying apassed-place-information sender apparatus 304 and anapparatus-information column 344 used for storing information on placesidentified by an apparatus identifier or used for storing information onevery commodity/service After receiving the identifier of an apparatusfrom the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304, thepassed-place-information receiver apparatus 326 refers to theapparatus-information storage unit 340 in order to convert theidentifier into the apparatus information and supplies the informationto the preference-information updating unit 328. In the case of anexample shown in FIG. 13, the passed-place-information receiverapparatus 326 receives a user identifier of 00001 and an apparatusidentifier of WCO022 from the passed-place-information sender apparatus304. In this case, as shown in the figure, the passed-place-informationreceiver apparatus 326 acquires apparatus information “W cleaning store”corresponding to the received apparatus identifier of WCO022 from theapparatus-information column 344. Then, the passed-place-informationreceiver apparatus 326 adds the information to thepreference-information column 334 corresponding to the received useridentifier of 00001.

The functional configurations of the user portable terminal 302, thepassed-place-information sender apparatus 304, and thepreference-information management server 314 have been described above.Next, by referring to a flowchart shown in FIG. 14, the followingdescription explains processing carried out in thepreference-information gathering system 300 according to the embodimentto gather user's preference information.

The flowchart begins with a step S302 at which thepreference-information management server 314 stores user's preferenceinformation (S304). To put it concretely, for example, when a user isregistered as a member, initial user's preference are inferred fromanswers each given by the user as a response to a questionnaire or thelike and stored in the preference-information storage unit 330. Then,the user portable terminal 302 stores a user identifier issued typicallyin a process to register the user as a member in the user-identifierstorage unit 318 (S304).

Subsequently, at the next step S306, the user typically holds the userportable terminal 302 in order to let the user portable terminal 302transmit the user identifier to the passed-place-information senderapparatus 304 (S306).

At a step S308, the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304receives the user identifier from the user portable terminal 302 (S308).Then, at the next step S310, the passed-place-information senderapparatus 304 produces a result of determination as to whether or notthe user identifier can be transmitted to the preference-informationmanagement server 314 (S310). If the result of the determinationindicates that the user identifier is allowed to transmit information ona place passed through or visited by the user, the flow of theprocessing goes on to a step S312. The passed-place-information senderapparatus 304 transmits the user identifier and an apparatus identifieridentifying the passed-place-information sender apparatus 304 to thepreference-information management server 314 by associating the useridentifier and apparatus identifiers with each other (S314).

At a step S314, the preference-information management server 314receives the user identifier and the identifier of thepassed-place-information sender apparatus 304 (S314). Subsequently, byusing the received identifier of the passed-place-information senderapparatus 304, the preference-information management server 314 updatesinformation associated with the received user identifier as user'spreference information (S316).

The above description has explained the flowchart representing theprocessing carried out in the preference-information gathering system300 according to the embodiment to gather user's preference information.

By providing the preference-information gathering system 300 accordingto the third embodiment with the configuration described above, it ispossible to use the preference-information management server 314 tomanage information on a place passed through or visited frequently by auser or information on every commodity/service, which are related tosuch a place, as user's preference information. Thepreference-information gathering system 300 has been described so far.Next, an information providing system 100 is explained.

<2. Information Providing System>

First Embodiment

A first embodiment implements an information providing system 100 inwhich, when a specific user visits a store offering commodities/servicesto users, information on the specific user's preference is selected frominformation, that can be provided by the store to all users ascommodity/service information, and given to the specific user.

First of all, the entire configuration of the information providingsystem 100 according to the embodiment is explained by referring toFIG. 1. As shown in the figure, the information providing system 100 hasa configuration typically including user portable terminals 102 a and102 b, a timing providing apparatus 104, a communication network 112 aswell as an information providing server 114.

The user portable terminals 102 a, 102 b, and so on, which are each usedby a user making use of the information providing system 100, are eachan information terminal used for storing an identifier for uniquelyidentifying the user. The user portable terminals 102 a, 102 b, and soon are each referred to hereafter simply as a user portable terminal102. The user portable terminal 102 of a user is capable of driving thetiming providing apparatus 104 to be described later to recognize theuser identifier. The user identifier is typically a user ID assigned tothe user in a process to register the user as a member. It is desirableto provide a user portable terminal 102 that has such a size and such aweight that the user portable terminal 102 can be carried by the userwith ease. Examples of the user portable terminal 102 are a magneticcard, an IC card, a mobile telephone, a PDA (Personal DigitalAssistant), a watch having an embedded IC chip, and an accessory. Inparticular, if the user portable terminal 102 is a terminal capable ofcarrying out non-contact communications with the timing providingapparatus 104 in order to transmit the user identifier to the timingproviding apparatus 104, such a user portable terminal 102 is convenientfor the user in that the user needs only to hold the user portableterminal 102 over a location in close proximity to the timing providingapparatus 104. Examples of such a user portable terminal 102 are an ICcard, a mobile telephone having IC chips embedded therein, a watchincluding such chips, and an accessory including such chips. It is to benoted that the non-contact communication between the user portableterminal 102 and the timing providing apparatus 104 is a communicationin which the user portable terminal 102 is not brought into physicalcontact with the timing providing apparatus 104. Even if the userportable terminal 102 is brought into physical contact with the timingproviding apparatus 104, the user portable terminal 102 is not broughtinto electrical contact with the timing providing apparatus 104. Thus,the non-contact communication is a radio communication. It is desirableto mainly carry out a non-contact communication only within a narrowrange of the order of about 10 cm in conformity with the NFC (Near FieldCommunication) standards specifying an RF carrier frequency of 13.56 MHzand a maximum communication speed of 212 Kbps.

It is also desirable to provide a user portable terminal 102 capable ofreceiving commodity/service information from the information providingserver 114 by way of the communication network 112 or the timingproviding apparatus 104. If the user portable terminal 102 is terminalreceiving commodity/service information from the information providingserver 114 by way of the communication network 112, it is desirable touse a terminal connectable to the communication network 112. Examples ofsuch a terminal are a mobile telephone and a PDA.

The information provided by the information providing server 114 to theuser by way of the user portable terminal 102 or the timing providingapparatus 104 as commodity/service information. The commodity/serviceinformation typically includes features and concrete substances of thecommodities/services, a place provided in a store as a place forexhibiting the commodities/services, discount coupons of thecommodities/services, a video content used for showing a portion of amovie to the user on a trial basis, and a musical content used forletting the user to listen to a portion of a piece of music on a trialbasis.

The timing providing apparatus 104 is connected to the informationproviding server 114 for providing the user with commodity/serviceinformation by the communication network 112. The timing providingapparatus 104 is an information processing apparatus capable ofnotifying the information providing server 114 of timing to provide theuser with such information on commodity/service information. The timingproviding apparatus 104 is set in a place capable of providing the userwith commodities/services related to the information that is transmittedby the information providing server 114 through the timing providingapparatus to the user portable terminal 102. In the case of thisembodiment, the timing providing apparatus 104 is installed at a storeoffering the commodities and the services. The timing providingapparatus 104 receives the user identifier from the user portableterminal 102 carried by the user visiting the store and transmits theidentifier to the information providing server 114. That is to say, thetiming providing apparatus 104 is capable of triggering the informationproviding server 114 to transmit information on commodities/servicesoffered by the store to the user portable terminal 102 carried by theuser visiting the store. The timing providing apparatus 104 has aconfiguration typically including a presented-information outputtingunit 106 and a user-identifier receiver unit 110.

The user-identifier receiver unit 110 is a unit for receiving the useridentifier from a user portable terminal 102. To put it concretely, theuser-identifier receiver unit 110 reads out the user identifier from amagnetic card or receives the user identifier from typically an IC card,a watch having an IC chip embedded therein, an accessory including sucha chip, or a mobile telephone by a radio communication or receives theuser identifier from a mobile telephone by an infrared communication.

The presented-information outputting unit 106 is a unit for outputtinginformation received from the information providing server 114 ascommodity/service information. With such a configuration, theinformation can be shown to the user even if the user portable terminal102 does not have a display unit or the like. To put it concretely, forexample, the timing providing apparatus 104 displays a movie contentreceived from the information providing server 114 and outputs a musicalcontent as information to be presented to the user. For a case in whichthe timing providing apparatus 104 receives information on a pluralityof commodities/services from the information providing server 114, thetiming providing apparatus 104 may be configured to display theinformation on all the commodities/services, let the user select somecommodities/services from the displayed ones, and transmit theinformation on the selected commodities/services to the user portableterminal 102. It is to be noted that the information providing server114 may also transmit information directly to the user portable terminal102 by way of the communication network 112 without passing theinformation through the timing providing apparatus 104. In this case,typically, a mobile telephone having display means or the like serves asthe user portable terminal 102. In addition, if it is not necessary tooutput information in the timing providing apparatus 104, thepresented-information outputting unit 106 may be eliminated from thetiming providing apparatus 104.

The timing providing apparatus 104 quickly transmits a user identifierreceived by the user-identifier receiver unit 110 to the informationproviding server 114 by way of the communication network 112. A detailedconfiguration of the timing providing apparatus 104 will be describedlater.

The communication network 112 is a network having a function todistribute user identifier and commodity/service information used in theembodiment. Examples of the communication network 112 include theInternet. The communication network 112 can be a wire-communication or aradio-communication network.

The information providing server 114 is an information processingapparatus for providing users utilizing the information providing system100 with commodity/service information. The information providing server114 receives a user identifier transmitted by the timing providingapparatus 104 by way of the communication network 112 and providesinformation on every recommended commodity/service, which is recommendedaccording to the user's preference, to a user identified by theidentifier by way of the user portable terminal 102 and/or the timingproviding apparatus 104.

In accordance with the information providing system 100 having theconfiguration described above, when a user visits a store offeringcommodities/services, the timing providing apparatus 104 receives theuser identifier from the user portable terminal 102, being notified thatthe user is visiting the store. Then, the timing providing apparatus 104transmits the user identifier to the information providing server 114 inorder to notify the information providing server 114 that the user isvisiting the store. Receiving the user identifier from the timingproviding apparatus 104, the information providing server 114 is capableof transmitting information on every recommended commodity/service,which are provided according to each user's preference identified by theidentifier, to the user portable terminal 102 by way of the timingproviding apparatus 104 or directly. That is to say, with the arrival ofthe user at the store used as a trigger, some commodities/some servicesare selected from every commodity/service, which are offered by thestore, and information on the selected commodities/services can then begiven to the user. As a result, since the user can receive informationon its own preference selected from every commodity/service, which areavailable in the store visited presently by the user, it is quite withinthe bounds of higher possibility that the information given to the usercan be utilized effectively.

The entire configuration of the information providing system 100 hasbeen described so far. Next, by referring to FIG. 15, the followingdescription explains the functional configurations of the user portableterminal 102, the timing providing apparatus 104, and the informationproviding server 114.

First of all, the hardware configurations of the user portable terminal102, the timing providing apparatus 104, and the information providingserver 114 are described briefly. Typically, the user portable terminal102, the timing providing apparatus 104, and the information providingserver 114 each have a CPU, a ROM, a RAM, and a hard disk.

The CPU is a section functioning as a processing unit as well as acontrol unit, which are capable of controlling processes carried out byother components employed in the user portable terminal 102, the timingproviding apparatus 104, or the information providing server 114. TheROM and the RAM are memories for temporarily storing information such asdata related to processing carried out by the CPU and a program executedby the CPU.

The hard disk is configured typically as a hard-disk drive or a flashmemory to serve as a storage unit used for storing information includingan OS (Operating System) and a variety of application programs. The harddisk has a configuration typically including a user-identifier storageunit 1120, a preference-information storage unit 1138, and apresented-information storage unit 1144, which will be described later.It is to be noted that each of the user-identifier storage unit 1120,the preference-information storage unit 1138, the presented-informationstorage unit 1144, and other memory portions can also be implemented asa ROM and/or a RAM instead of a portion of the hard disk.

If the user portable terminal 102 is a magnetic card or the like, theCPU and some other components can be eliminated from the user portableterminal 102. If the user portable terminal 102 is a mobile telephonehaving IC chips, an IC card having such chips or the like, an EEPROM isemployed. In this case, the user-identifier storage unit 1120 can beincluded in the EEPROM.

Next, the functional configurations are explained. The user portableterminal 102 has a configuration typically including the user-identifierstorage unit 1120, a user-identifier sender unit 1122, and apresented-information receiver unit 1124. The user-identifier storageunit 1120 is a memory used for storing a user identifier uniquelyidentifying the user in the information providing system 100. Theuser-identifier sender unit 1122 is a unit for reading out the useridentifier from the user-identifier storage unit 1120 and transmittingthe identifier to the timing providing apparatus 104.

The presented-information receiver unit 1124 functions as a unit forreceiving information transmitted by the information providing server114 by way of the timing providing apparatus 104 as commodity/serviceinformation.

The timing providing apparatus 104 has a configuration typicallyincluding a user-identifier receiver unit 110, a timing-informationsender unit 1128, a presented-information outputting unit 106, and apresented-information relaying unit 1132.

The user-identifier receiver unit 110 functions as a unit for receivingthe user identifier from the user portable terminal 102 as describedabove. The user-identifier receiver unit 110 passes on a received useridentifier to the timing-information sender unit 1128.

The timing-information sender unit 1128 functions as a unit fortransmitting a user identifier received from the user-identifierreceiver unit 110 to the information providing server 114. Let us keepin mind that it is desirable to transmit the user identifier from thetiming-information sender unit 1128 to the information providing server114 right after the timing-information sender unit 1128 receives theidentifier from the user-identifier receiver unit 110.

The presented-information relaying unit 1132 functions as a unit forreceiving commodity/service information from the information providingserver 114 as information to be presented to a user. Informationreceived by the presented-information relaying unit 1132 from theinformation providing server 114 as information to be transmitted to theuser portable terminal 102 is based on information to be described lateras user's preference. The information based on user's preference mayinclude discount coupons of every commodity/service, which are eachrecommended by the information providing server 114 as user'spreference, features of the commodities/services, or a place provided ina store as a place for exhibiting the commodities/services. Inaccordance with this configuration, a company offeringcommodities/services is capable of providing not only informationrequested by a user, but also information on every commodity/service,which are each recommended as user's preference. Thus, sales of thecommodities/services can be promoted.

As described above, the presented-information outputting unit 106functions as a unit for providing the user with information receivedfrom the information providing server 114 as commodity/serviceinformation and outputting sounds to be heard by the user.

The information providing server 114 has a configuration typicallyincluding a timing-information receiver unit 1134, apreference-information acquisition unit 1136, a preference-informationstorage unit 1138, a presented-information sender unit 1140, apresented-information acquisition unit 1142, and a presented-informationstorage unit 1144. The timing-information receiver unit 1134 functionsas a unit for receiving a user identifier transmitted by the timingproviding apparatus 104 by way of the communication network 112.

The preference-information acquisition unit 1136 functions as a unit foracquiring user's preference information stored in thepreference-information storage unit 1138 on the basis of the useridentifier received by the timing-information receiver unit 1134. Thepreference-information storage unit 1138 functions as a memory used forstoring user's preference information. To put it concretely, forexample, the preference-information storage unit 1138 is used forstoring preference information and a user identifier associated with theinformation for each user identifier. As shown in FIG. 16, thepreference-information storage unit 1138 has a configuration typicallyincluding a user-identifier column 1150 for storing user IDs, which eachidentify a user registered as a member, in advance and apreference-information column 1152 used for storing pieces of user'spreference information associated with the user identifier identifyingthe user. The user's preference include preference, which were recordedwhen the user was registered as a member, and preferences extracted frompurchasing records of the user.

The presented-information storage unit 1144 functions as a memory usedfor storing information to be provided to a user as commodity/serviceinformation. To put it concretely, as described earlier, thecommodity/service information typically includes features and concretesubstances of the commodities/services, places each provided in a storeas a place for exhibiting the commodities/services, discount coupons ofthe commodities/services, a video content used for showing a portion ofa movie to the user on a trial basis, and a musical content used forletting the user to listen to a portion of a piece of music on a trialbasis.

The presented-information acquisition unit 1142 functions as a unit foracquiring information on each commodity and/or each service, which serveas user's preference, from the presented-information storage unit 1144on the basis of information acquired by the preference-informationacquisition unit 1136 as information on the user's preference. Forexample, the presented-information acquisition unit 1142 is capable ofsearching the presented-information storage unit for commodity/serviceinformation by using the information, which is acquired by thepreference-information acquisition unit 1136 as preference information,as a keyword. Details of this operation are explained concretely byreferring to FIG. 16 as follows. Let us assume for example that thetiming-information receiver unit 1134 receives a user identifier of00003 from the timing providing apparatus 104. In this case, thepreference-information acquisition unit 1136 acquires information suchas ‘Animation’ and ‘Music’ from the preference-information storage unit1138 as user's preference information identified as the user identifierof 00003. Let us also assume for example that the presented-informationstorage unit 1144 is used for storing information on videos classifiedby video genre as commodity/service information. An example of theinformation on videos is coupons for the videos offered by a rentalvideo store. In this case, the presented-information acquisition unit1142 is capable of acquiring information stored in thepresented-information storage unit 1144 as pieces of informationpertaining to the animation and music genres respectively.

The presented-information sender unit 1140 functions as a unit fortransmitting information acquired by the presented-informationacquisition unit 1142 as commodity/service information to the timingproviding apparatus 104. In other words, the presented-informationsender unit 1140 transmits commodity/service information to the userportable terminal 102 by way of the timing providing apparatus 104.

The functional configurations of the user portable terminal 102, thetiming providing apparatus 104, and the information providing server 114have been explained above. Next, by referring to a flowchart shown inFIG. 17, the following description explains processing carried out bythe information providing system 100 according to the embodiment toprovide commodity/service information to a user.

The flowchart begins with a step S1102 at which the informationproviding server 114 stores information on every commodity/service,which can each be provided to the user, in the presented-informationstorage unit 1144 (S1102). It is to be noted that information to bestored in the presented-information storage unit 1144 may be created inthe information providing server 114, transmitted from another computerto the information providing server 114 by way of the communicationnetwork 112, or obtained in accordance with another technique. Then, atthe next step S1104, the information providing server 114 stores user'spreference information in the preference-information storage unit 1138(S1104). To put it concretely, for example, the stored user's preferenceinformation is information based on answers each given by the user as aresponse to a questionnaire in a process to register the user as amember, purchasing records of the user and/or the like as describedbefore.

At a step S1106, on the other hand, the user portable terminal 102stores the user identifier (S1106). To put it concretely, for example,the user portable terminal 102 stores a user identifier issued typicallyin a process to register the user as a member in the user-identifierstorage unit 1120. Then, at the next step S1108, when the user arrivesat a store, in which the timing providing apparatus 104 has beeninstalled and, when the user holds the user portable terminal 102 over aposition in close proximity to the timing providing apparatus 104, forexample, the user identifier is capable of being transmitted by the userportable terminal 102 to the timing providing apparatus 104 (S1108).

At a step S1110, the timing providing apparatus 104 receives the useridentifier from the user portable terminal 102 (S1110). Then, at thenext step S1112, the timing providing apparatus 104 quickly passes onthe user identifier to the information providing server 114 (S1112).

At a step S1114, the information providing server 114 receives the useridentifier from the timing providing apparatus 104 (S1114). Then, at thenext step S1116, the information providing server 114 acquires user'spreference information identified by the received user identifier fromthe preference-information storage unit 1138 (S1116). Subsequently, atthe next step S1118, the information providing server 114 acquiresinformation on every commodity/service, which are each regarded as auser's preference on the basis of the user's preference information,from the presented-information storage unit 1144 (S1118). Then, at thenext step, the information providing server 114 transmits thecommodity/service information to the timing providing apparatus 104(S1120). It is desirable to have the information providing server 114carry out the processes of the steps S1114 to S1120 promptly. That is tosay, right after receiving the user identifier from the timing providingapparatus 104, it is desirable to have the information providing server114 transmit the commodity/service information to the user portableterminal 102 by way of the timing providing apparatus 104.

At a step S1122, the timing providing apparatus 104 receives thecommodity/service information from the information providing server 114as information to be provided to the user (S1122). If necessary, thetiming providing apparatus 104 outputs the commodity/service informationby displaying video information and generating audio information for thecommodity/service information (S1124). Then, at the next step S1126, thetiming providing apparatus 104 passes on the commodity/serviceinformation to the user portable terminal 102 (S1126). At a step S1128,the user portable terminal 102 receives the commodity/serviceinformation (S1128). In this way, the user is capable of obtainingtypically useful user's preference information itself as informationthat can be utilized in the store immediately.

It is to be noted that the timing providing apparatus 104 and theinformation providing server 114 can be integrated to form a singleapparatus having the functions of both the timing providing apparatus104 and the information providing server 114. Even in this case, thesingle apparatus having such a configuration can be implemented in theinformation providing system 100 according to the embodiment.

The above description has explained the flowchart representing theprocessing carried out by the information providing system 100 accordingto the embodiment to provide commodity/service information to a user.

By providing the information providing system 100 according to the firstembodiment with the configuration described above, it is possible toprovide a user visiting a store or the like offeringcommodities/services with information on every commodity/service, whichare each inferred to be a information useful to the user, as informationreadily usable in the store or the like as well as user's preferenceinformation. That is to say, it is possible to provide a user withinformation suitable for the user with timing proper for the user.

Second Embodiment

A second embodiment implements an information-providing system 1200capable of selecting user's preference information from information onevery commodity/service, which are each related to a specific place,when the user passes through the place and capable of providing the userwith the user's preference information.

First of all, the entire configuration of the information-providingsystem 1200 according to the embodiment is explained by referring toFIG. 18. As shown in the figure, the information-providing system 1200has a configuration typically including a user portable terminal 1202,timing providing apparatus 1204 a, 1204 b, land so on, a communicationnetwork 1212 as well as an information-providing server 1214.

The user portable terminal 1202 is an information terminal used forstoring an identifier for uniquely identifying the user making use ofthe information-providing system 1200. The user portable terminal 1202is capable of driving the timing providing apparatus 1204, which will bedescribed later, to recognize the user identifier. The user portableterminal 1202 is capable of receiving commodity/service information fromthe information-providing server 1214 also to be described later. Theuser identifier is typically a user ID assigned to the user in a processto register the user as a member. The user portable terminal 1202functions as a unit that can be connected to the communication network1212. It is desirable to provide a user portable terminal 1202 that hassuch a size and such a weight that the user portable terminal 1202 canbe carried by the user with ease. Examples of the user portable terminal1202 are a mobile telephone and a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant). Inparticular, if the user portable terminal 1202 is a terminal capable ofcarrying out non-contact communications with the timing-providingapparatus 1204 in order to transmit the user identifier to thetiming-providing apparatus 1204, such a user portable terminal 1202 isconvenient for the user in that the user needs only to hold the userportable terminal 1202 over a location in close proximity to thetiming-providing apparatus 1204. Examples of such a user portableterminal 1202 are a mobile telephone having IC chips embedded thereinand a PDA. It is to be noted that the non-contact communication betweenthe user portable terminal 1202 and the timing-providing apparatus 1204is a communication in which the user portable terminal 1202 is notbrought into physical contact with the timing-providing apparatus 1204.Even if the user portable terminal 1202 is brought into physical contactwith the timing-providing apparatus 1204, the user portable terminal1202 is not brought into electrical contact with the timing-providingapparatus 1204.

The timing-providing apparatus 1204 a, 1204 b, and so on, which are eachreferred to hereafter simply a timing-providing apparatus 1204, are eachconnected to the information-providing server 1214 by the communicationnetwork 1212 and each function as an information processing apparatusfor notifying the information-providing server 1214 of timing to provideinformation to the user. In this embodiment, the timing-providingapparatus 1204 is incorporated as a part of an automatic ticket gate ofa station, an entrance door of a store, or the like as shown in thefigure. As an alternative, the timing-providing apparatus 1204 isinstalled at a special-commodity sales department of a store or anyother location in the store. By placing the timing-providing apparatus1204 at such a place, the timing-providing apparatus 1204 is capable ofacquiring the user identifier from the user portable terminal 1202 whenthe user passes through or visits the place and transmitting the useridentifier to the information-providing server 1214 along with anapparatus identifier identifying the timing-providing apparatus 1204.That is to say, the timing-providing apparatus 1204 is capable ofproviding a trigger to the information providing server 1214. Thetrigger is to provide information on every commodity/service, which areeach relevant to the place to which the timing providing apparatus isset, to a user passing through or visiting the place. Thetiming-providing apparatus 1204 has user-identifier receiver units 1210a, 1210 b, and so on, which are each referred to hereafter simply as auser-identifier receiver unit 1210.

The user-identifier receiver unit 1210 functions as a unit for receivingthe user identifier from the user portable terminal 1202. To put itconcretely, for example, the user-identifier receiver unit 1210 receivesthe user identifier from an IC chip, which is embedded in a mobiletelephone or a PDA, by a radio communication. As another example, theuser-identifier receiver unit 1210 receives the user identifier from amobile telephone or the like by an infrared communication.

The timing-providing apparatus 1204 quickly transmits a user identifierreceived by the user-identifier receiver unit 1210 to theinformation-providing server 1214 by way of the communication network1212. A detailed configuration of the timing-providing apparatus 1204will be described later.

The communication network 1212 is a network having a function todistribute the user identifier and commodity/service information.Examples of the communication network 1212 include Internet. Thecommunication network 112 can be a wire-communication or aradio-communication network.

The information-providing server 1214 functions as an informationprocessing apparatus for providing commodity/service information tousers utilizing the information-providing system 1200. Theinformation-providing server 1214 receives the user identifier from atiming-providing apparatus 1204, which transmits the identifier to theinformation-providing server 1214 through the communication network1212. The information-providing server 1214 also receives the identifierof an apparatus from the timing-providing apparatus 1204, whichtransmits the identifier to the information-providing server 1214 alsothrough the communication network 1212. The identifier of an apparatusis an identifier for identifying the timing-providing apparatus 1204.The information-providing server 1214 then transmits information onrecommended commodities/services identified by the user identifier asuser's preference to the user portable terminal 1202 selectedrespectively from every commodity/service, which are relevant to thetiming-providing apparatus 1204 identified by the apparatus identifier.

In accordance with the information-providing system 1200 having theconfiguration described above, when a user passes through a specificplace, the timing-providing apparatus 1204 recognizes the fact that theuser has passed through the place by receiving the user identifier froma user portable terminal 1202. Then, the timing-providing apparatus 1204transmits the user identifier and the identifier of its own to theinformation-providing server 1214 by associating the identifiers witheach other in order to notify the information-providing server 1214 ofthe fact that the user has passed through the specific place. Theinformation-providing server 1214 receives the user identifier and theidentifier of the timing-providing apparatus 1204 from thetiming-providing apparatus 1204. Then, the information-providing server1214 transmits information on recommended commodities/services to theuser portable terminal 1202. The recommended commodities/services areselected respectively from every commodity/service, which are eachrelevant to the timing-providing apparatus 1204 identified by theapparatus identifier according to the user's preference identified bythe user identifier. That is to say, the event that the user is passingthrough the specific place is used as a trigger to provide the user withinformation on every commodity/service, which is selected respectivelyfrom all commodities/services relevant to the place, ascommodities/services suitable for the user. As a result, since the usercan receive information on its own preference selected from everycommodity/service, which are each relevant to the place visitedpresently by the user, it is quite within the bounds of higherpossibility that the information given to the user can be utilizedeffectively.

The entire configuration of the information-providing system 1200 hasbeen explained above. Next, by referring to FIG. 19, the followingdescription explains the functional configurations of the user portableterminal 1202, the timing-providing apparatus 1204, and theinformation-providing server 1214. It is to be noted that, since thehardware configurations are all but the same as those of thecorresponding ones according to the first embodiment, the explanation ofthe hardware configurations is omitted.

The user portable terminal 1202 has a configuration typically includinga user-identifier storage unit 1220, a user-identifier sender unit 1222,and a presented-information receiver unit 1224. The user-identifierstorage unit 1220 functions as a memory used for storing a useridentifier uniquely identifying a user in the preference-informationgathering system 1200. The user-identifier sender unit 1222 functions asa unit for acquiring the user identifier from the user-identifierstorage unit 1220 and transmits the identifier to the timing-providingapparatus 1204.

The presented-information receiver unit 1224 functions as a unit forreceiving information transmitted by the information-providing server1214 by way of the communication network 1212 as commodity/serviceinformation.

The timing-providing apparatus 1204 has a configuration typicallyincluding a user-identifier receiver unit 1210, a timing-informationsender unit 1228, and an apparatus-identifier storage unit 1230.

The user-identifier receiver unit 1210 functions as a unit for receivingthe user identifier from the user portable terminal 1202 and passing onthe identifier to the timing-information sender unit 1228.

The apparatus-identifier storage unit 1230 functions as a memory usedfor storing an identifier uniquely identifying the timing-providingapparatus in the information-providing system 1200. In other words, if aplurality of timing-providing apparatus 1204 exist in theinformation-providing system 1200, identifiers each unique to one of thetiming-providing apparatus 1204 are used for distinguishing thetiming-providing apparatus 1204 from each other.

The timing-information sender unit 1228 functions as a unit fortransmitting a user identifier received from the user-identifierreceiver unit 1210 and the apparatus identifier read out from theapparatus-identifier storage unit 1230 to the information-providingserver 1214 by associating the identifiers with each other. It is to benoted that the timing-providing apparatus 1204 may also employ atransmission determining unit (not shown) for producing a result ofdetermination as to whether or not a user identifier can be transmittedto the information-providing server 1214 on the basis of the useridentifier.

The information-providing server 1214 has a configuration typicallyincluding a timing-information receiver unit 1234, a preferenceinformation acquisition unit 1236, a user-information storage unit 1248,a presented-information sender unit 1240, a presented-informationacquisition unit 1242, a presented-information storage unit 1244, aclassification-information storage unit 1246, and a user informationstorage unit 1248. Since the preference-information updating unit 1236and the preference-information storage unit 1238 have all but the samefunctions as respectively the preference-information acquisition unit1136 and the preference-information storage unit 1138, which areemployed in the first embodiment, no explanations of them are given. Inaddition, the function of the timing-information receiver unit 1234 isalmost the same as that of the timing-information receiver unit 1134employed in the first embodiment except that the timing-informationreceiver unit 1234 also receives the apparatus identifier from thetiming-providing apparatus 1204 besides the user identifier.

The presented-information storage unit 1244 functions as a memory forstoring information on every commodity/service, which is to be providedto users. To put it concretely, the stored commodity/service informationtypically includes features and concrete substances of thecommodities/services, places each provided in a store as a place forexhibiting the commodities/services and discount coupons of thecommodities/services. The stored information is classified on the basisof predetermined criteria into categories associated with theirrespective classification codes to be explained later. Theclassification codes are also stored along with the information. As willbe described later, the predetermined criteria are places related to thecommodity/service information.

The classification-information storage unit 1246 functions as a memoryfor storing, among others, information on each place, at which atiming-providing apparatus 1204 is installed. Theclassification-information storage unit 1246 and thepresented-information storage unit 1244 are explained in detail byreferring to FIGS. 20 and 21 respectively.

As shown in FIG. 20, the classification-information storage unit 1246 isused for storing every apparatus identifier, every classification code,and every classification substance by associating each other. Theclassification-information storage unit 1246 has an apparatus-identifiercolumn 1260 used for storing the identifiers each identifying atiming-providing apparatus 1204. For each of the apparatus identifiers,a classification-substance column 1264 is used for storing an apparatusinstallation place or at which a timing-providing apparatus 1204identified by the apparatus identifier is installed. Aclassification-code column 1262 includes a code obtained as a result ofclassifying classification substances on the basis of a predeterminedreference. In the case of this embodiment, the code is a classificationcode identifying the classification substance. In accordance with afirst row shown in FIG. 20, for example, a timing-providing apparatus1204 identified by an apparatus identifier of 00001 is installed at thesouth gate of Shinjuku Station, which is classified as a classificationsubstance identified by a classification code of S01.

On the other hand, as shown in FIG. 21, the presented-informationstorage unit 1244 is used for storing every classification codementioned above and pieces of commodity/service information byassociating the classification code with the pieces of information witheach other. The classification-code column 1262 stores a classificationcode corresponding to the classification code 1262 in theclassification-information storage unit 1246. For each of theclassification codes, a commodity/service-information column 1270 isused for storing the pieces of information. As shown in the figure, thepieces of information include a commodity exhibition place and a coupon.To put it concretely, according to FIG. 20 and FIG. 21, theclassification code of S01 represents the south gate of Shinjuku Stationand information on every commodity/service, which are each available atthe south gate of Shinjuku Station. The commodity/service informationincludes information on new arrivals at I Department Store, informationon an S camera store introduced as a new commodity, and a discountcoupon offered by M Restaurant.

The presented-information acquisition unit 1242 functions as a unit foracquiring information on every commodity/service, which is suitable fora user, by selecting the information from pieces of commodity/serviceinformation. The commodity/service information is informationcorresponding to a classification code associated with an apparatusidentifier received from the timing-providing apparatus 1204. To put itin more detail, the presented-information acquisition unit 1242 receivesthe identifier of the timing-providing apparatus 1204 from thetiming-information receiver unit 1234 and user's preference informationfrom the preference-information updating unit 1236. Then, thepresented-information acquisition unit 1242 selects information matchingthe user's preference information from the information on everycommodity/service, which are each relevant to a timing-providingapparatus 1204 identified by the received identifier of thetiming-providing apparatus 1204, and acquires the selected informationfrom the presented-information storage unit 1244. In accordance with theconfiguration described above, the information providing server 1214 iscapable of changing information to be provided to a user, depending onthe timing providing apparatus identified by an apparatus identifier.

To put it concretely, let us assume for example that thepresented-information acquisition unit 1242 receives an apparatusidentifier of 00001 and ‘electrical appliances’ as preferenceinformation. In this case, first of all, the presented-informationacquisition unit 1242 acquires a classification code of S01 associatedwith the apparatus identifier of 00001 from theclassification-information storage unit 1246.

Then, the presented-information acquisition unit 1242 searches theinformation stored in the presented-information storage unit 1244 bybeing put on a row associated with the classification code of S01 ascommodity/service information by using the phrase of ‘electricalappliances’ or a similar phrase as a keyword for information matchingthe keyword. As a result of the search process, for example, informationon an S camera store is obtained.

The presented-information sender unit 1240 functions as a unit foracquiring the user identifier as well as information to be provided tothe user as commodity/service information from the presented-informationacquisition unit 1242 and transmitting the information to the user. Inthe process to transmit the information to the user portable terminal1202 carried by the user, the presented-information sender unit 1240refers to the user-information storage unit 1248. The user-informationstorage unit 1248 functions as a memory for storing the identifier ofevery user and the identifier of every user portable terminal 1202 byassociating the identifiers with each other. The user identifierportable terminal 1202 is typically the mail address of the userportable terminal 1202.

The above description has explained the functional configurations of theuser portable terminal 1202, the timing-providing apparatus 1204, andthe information-providing server 1214. Next, by referring to a flowchartshown in FIG. 22, the following description explains processing carriedout by the information-providing system 1200 according to the embodimentto provide a user with commodity/service information.

The flowchart begins with a step S1200 at which theinformation-providing server 1214 stores a classification informationassociating the timing-providing apparatus 1204 and the installationplace of the timing-providing apparatus 1204 in theclassification-information storage unit 1246 (S1200). Then, at the nextstep S1202, the information-providing server 1214 storescommodity/service information as information that can be provided by theinformation-providing server 1214 to users in the presented-informationstorage unit 1244 (S1202). Subsequently, at the next step S1203, theinformation-providing server 1214 stores information on users in theuser-information storage unit 1248 (S1203). The information on usersincludes the identifier of each user and the mail address of a userportable terminal 1202. Then, the information-providing server 1214stores the user's preference information in the preference-informationstorage unit 1238 (S1204). To put it concretely, for example, in aprocess to register a user as a member, the information-providing server1214 stores an address, which is received from the user as the mailaddress of the user portable terminal 1202, in the user-informationstorage unit 1248 as information on the user. As user's preferenceinformation, the information-providing server 1214 stores typicallyanswers each given by the user as a response to a questionnaire in theprocess to register the user as a member, purchasing records of the userin the preference-information storage unit 1238, and/or the like.

At a step S1206, on the other hand, the user portable terminal 1202stores the user identifier (S1206). To put it concretely, for example,the user portable terminal 1202 stores a user identifier issued to theuser in a process to register the user as a member in theuser-identifier storage unit 1220. Then, at the next step S1208, whenthe user passes through the installation place of the timing-providingapparatus 1204, for example, the user portable terminal 1202 transmitsthe user identifier to the timing-providing apparatus 1204 (S1208).

At a step S1210, the timing-providing apparatus 1204 receives the useridentifier from the user portable terminal 1202 (S1210). Then, at thenext step S1212, the timing-providing apparatus 1204 promptly transmitsthe user identifier and an apparatus identifier identifying thetiming-providing apparatus 1204 to the information-providing server 1214(S1212).

At a step S1214, the information-providing server 1214 receives the useridentifier and the apparatus identifier from the timing-providingapparatus 1204 (S1214). Then, at the next step S1216, theinformation-providing server 1214 acquires user's preference informationidentified by the user identifier from the preference-informationstorage unit 1238 (S1216). Subsequently, at the next step S1218, theinformation-providing server 1214 acquires a classification codeassociated with the identifier of the timing-providing apparatus 1204(S1218). Then, at the next step, the information-providing server 1214acquires information from the presented-information storage unit 1244 asinformation on every commodity/service, which are each available at theinstallation place of the timing-providing apparatus 1204 and suitablefor the user, on the basis of the classification code and the user'spreference information (S1220). Subsequently, at the next step S1222,the information-providing server 1214 transmits the information on everycommodity/service to the user portable terminal 1202 (S1222).

At a step S1224, the user portable terminal 1202 receives theinformation on every commodity/service (S1224). In this way, the usercan obtain information on every commodity/service, which is offered atthe present location of the user as user's preference.

The above description has explained the flowchart representing theprocessing carried out by the information-providing system 1200according to the embodiment to provide a user with commodity/serviceinformation.

By providing the information-providing system 1200 according to theembodiment with the configuration described above, a user passingthrough a specific place can obtain information inferred to be usefulfor the user each relevant to the specific place and/or serve as user'spreference. That is to say, information appropriate for a user can beprovided to the user with timing proper for the user. It is to be notedthat the functions of the user portable terminal, the timing-providingapparatus, and the information-providing server can be carried out byexecution of computer programs, which can be provided by using recordingmediums for recording the programs in such a way that the programs canbe read out by a computer from the mediums for execution. The abovedescription has explained the information-providing system 1200. Next,an electronic-value distribution system 100 is described.

<3. Electronic-Value Distribution System>

First Embodiment

A first embodiment implements an electronic-value distribution system100 capable of distributing electronic coupons each serving as a typicalelectronic value to a plurality of users by allowing a user to transferan electronic coupon to another user. In a process to transfer anelectronic coupon from a user to another one, the electronic-valuedistribution system 100 is also capable of reflecting information on atransferred electronic coupon in user's preference information involvedin the process.

An electronic value is information provided by a provider ofcommodities/services to customers as information having a financialvalue. An example of the electronic value is electrical informationrepresenting a discount coupon given by a provider ofcommodities/services to a customer as a coupon making the customerentitled to a discount on a commodity or a service. Such information isreferred to as an electronic coupon. Another example of the electronicvalue is points given in accordance with the value of a commodity and/ora service by a provider of commodities/services to a customer purchasinga commodity and/or a service as information making the customer entitledto a discount on a commodity or a service in a next shopping or allowingthe customer to exchange the information with a gift. Information on anelectronic value is typically a keyword serving as the identifier of thevalue or indicating the substance the value. Thus, information on anelectronic value is information indicating what the electronic value is.

First of all, the entire configuration of the electronic-valuedistribution system 100 according to the embodiment is explained byreferring to FIG. 1. The electronic-value distribution system 100 has aconfiguration typically including user portable terminals 102 a and 102b, an electronic-value distribution apparatus 104, a communicationnetwork 112 as well as an electronic-value issuing server 114.

The user portable terminals 102 a, 102 b, and so on are each aninformation terminal used for storing an identifier for uniquelyidentifying the user making use of the electronic-value distributionsystem 100 and for storing electronic coupons. As described above, anelectronic coupon is electrical information on a discount coupon on acommodity and/or a service. The user portable terminals 102 a, 102 b,and so on are each referred to hereafter simply as a user portableterminal 102. The user portable terminal 102 is capable of transmittingthe user identifier and an electronic coupon to the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 104 to be described later. It is desirable toprovide a user portable terminal 102 that has such a size and such aweight that the user portable terminal 102 can be carried by the userwith ease. Examples of the user portable terminal 102 are a magneticcard, an IC card, a mobile telephone, a PDA (Personal DigitalAssistant), a watch having an embedded IC chip, and an accessoryincluding such a chip.

The user portable terminal 102 according to the embodiment has a storageunit used for storing the user identifier and a storage unit for usedstoring electronic coupons. The example of the user portable terminal isa card embedded IC chip and mobile telephone. The user portable terminal102 is capable of carrying out non-contact communications with theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104. The non-contactcommunication between the user portable terminal 102 and theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 is a communication in whichthe user portable terminal 102 is not brought into physical contact withthe electronic-value distribution apparatus 104. Even if the userportable terminal 102 is brought into physical contact with theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104, the user portable terminal102 is not brought into electrical contact with the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 104. If the user portable terminal 102 is aterminal capable of carrying out non-contact communications with theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 in order to transmit theuser identifier and an electronic coupon to the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 104, such a user portable terminal 102 isconvenient for the user in that the user needs only to hold the userportable terminal 102 over a location in close proximity to theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104. Thus, the non-contactcommunication is a radio communication. Let us keep in mind, however,that it is desirable to mainly carry out a non-contact communicationonly within a narrow range of the order of about 10 cm in conformitywith the NFC (Near Field Communication) standards specifying an RFcarrier frequency of 13.56 MHz and a maximum communication speed of 212Kbps.

The electronic-value distribution apparatus 104 is an informationprocessing apparatus capable of exchanging electronic coupons with theuser portable terminal 102 as well as transmitting distributioninformation of an electronic coupon to the electronic-value issuingserver 114, which functions as an apparatus for providing electroniccoupons to users, by way of the communication network 112 connecting theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 to the electronic-valueissuing server 114. The electronic-value distribution apparatus 104allows an electronic coupon to be transferred from any user portableterminal 102 to others among two or more user portable terminals 102 soas to distribute electronic values to users of the terminals 102.

The distribution information of an electronic coupon is typicallyinformation indicating which user has transferred an electronic couponto another user, which electronic coupon has been transferred by a userto another, and which user has received a transferred electronic couponfrom another user. To put it concretely, the distribution information ofan electronic coupon is a combination of information such as identifierseach identifying a user and keywords, which each represent theidentifier and substance of an electronic coupon. By letting theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 provide distributioninformation of an electronic coupon to the electronic-value issuingserver 114, the electronic-value issuing server 114 is capable ofgrasping the state of distribution of the electronic coupon and, hence,inferring a change in user's preference. On the basis of a change inuser's preference, the electronic-value issuing server 114 is thuscapable of determining information such as an electronic coupon to beissued to the user next time.

In the embodiment, the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104employs a non-contact communication unit 110 for exchanging anelectronic coupon with the user portable terminal 102 in a non-contactcommunication. If the user portable terminal 102 is an IC card having nodisplay unit for displaying the substance of an electronic coupon, forexample, the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104 may employ adisplay unit 106 for displaying the substance of an electronic couponreceived from the user portable terminal 102. In addition, theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 may also employ anelectronic-coupon selection unit 108 for letting the user select aspecific one from electronic coupons displayed on the display unit 106.Typically, the selected specific electronic coupon is a desired couponor a coupon that the user wants to transfer to another user. Theelectronic-coupon selection unit 108 is typically an input unit such asa keyboard, a touch panel, and a mouse. The electronic-coupon selectionunit 108 is thus an input unit allowing the user to select a desiredelectronic coupon among those appearing on the display unit 106.

The communication network 112 is a network having a function to transmitinformation including the user identifier and an electronic coupon.Examples of the communication network 112 include the Internet. Thecommunication network 112 can be a wire-communication or aradio-communication network.

The electronic-value issuing server 114 is an information processingapparatus for issuing an electronic coupon to a user utilizing theelectronic-value distribution system 100 as a coupon according to auser's preference. The electronic-value issuing server 114 is capable ofreceiving a user identifier and information, which are transmitted bythe electronic-value distribution apparatus 104 to the electronic-valueissuing server 114 by way of the communication network 112, asrespectively an identifier identifying a user and distributioninformation of an electronic coupon. The electronic-value issuing server114 is also capable of reflecting the distribution information of anelectronic coupon in user's preference and transmitting an electroniccoupon according to user's preference to the user portable terminal 102.

By virtue of the configuration described above, the electronic-valuedistribution system 100 allows an electronic coupon to be transferredfrom a user portable terminal 102 to another user portable terminal 102by way of the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104. In addition,by having the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104 transmit thestate of a transfer of an electronic coupon to the electronic-valueissuing server 114 as distribution information of the electronic coupon,the electronic-value issuing server 114 is capable of knowing the stateof distribution of the electronic coupon as a post-issuance state otherthan the state of utilization of the coupon. By letting theelectronic-value issuing server 114 know the state of a transfer of anelectronic coupon, the electronic-value issuing server 114 is capable ofreflecting a change in user's preference in an electronic coupon issuednext time.

The entire configuration of the electronic-value distribution system 100has been described above. It is to be noted that the electronic-valueissuing server 114 and the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104can also be integrated into a single apparatus. Next, the functionalconfigurations of the user portable terminal 102, the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 104, and the electronic-value issuing server 114are explained by referring to FIG. 23.

First of all, the hardware configurations of the user portable terminal102, the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104, and theelectronic-value issuing server 114 are explained briefly. Typically,the user portable terminal 102, the electronic-value distributionapparatus 104, and the electronic-value issuing server 114 each have aCPU, a ROM, a RAM, and a hard disk.

The CPU is a section functioning as a processing unit as well as acontrol unit, which are capable of controlling processes carried out byother components employed in the user portable terminal 102, theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104, and the electronic-valueissuing server 114. The ROM and the RAM are memories for temporarilystoring information such as data related to processing carried out bythe CPU and a program executed by the CPU.

The hard disk is configured typically as a hard-disk drive or a flashmemory to serve as a storage unit used for storing information includingan OS (operating System) and a variety of application programs. The harddisk has a configuration typically including an electronic-value storageunit 2122, a user-identifier storage unit 2130, an electronic-valueaccumulation unit 2154, and a preference-information storage unit 2156,which will be described later. It is to be noted that each of theelectronic-value storage unit 2122, the user-identifier storage unit2130, the electronic-value accumulation unit 2154, thepreference-information storage unit 2156, and other memory portions canalso be implemented as a ROM and/or a RAM instead of a portion of thehard disk.

In addition, if the user portable terminal 102 is a magnetic card or thelike, the CPU and other components may be omitted from the configurationof the user portable terminal 102. If the user portable terminal 202 isa mobile telephone having IC chips, an IC card having such chips or thelike, an EEPROM is employed. In this case, the electronic-value storageunit 2122 and the user-identifier storage unit 2130 can be included inthe EEPROM.

Next, the functional configurations are explained. The user portableterminal 102 has a configuration typically including an electronic-valueacquisition unit 2120, an electronic-value storage unit 2122, a terminalelectronic-value selection unit 2124, a terminal electronic-value senderunit 2126, a terminal electronic-value receiver unit 2128, theuser-identifier storage unit 2130, and a user-identifier sender unit2132.

The electronic-value acquisition unit 2120 functions as a unit foracquiring an electronic value from the electronic-value issuing server114 and storing the value in the electronic-value storage unit 2122. Toput it concretely, for example, the electronic-value acquisition unit2120 receives an electronic coupon, which is transmitted by theelectronic-value issuing server 114 as an email or the like to the userportable terminal 102 by way of the communication network 112 and theelectronic-value acquisition unit 2120 stores the coupon in theelectronic-value storage unit 2122.

The electronic-value storage unit 2122 functions as a memory used forstoring electronic values. The electronic-value storage unit 2122 isused for storing electronic coupons, which are each a coupon selectedand issued by the electronic-value issuing server 114 from those storedin an electronic-value accumulation unit 2154 employed in theelectronic-value issuing server 114 as a coupon agreeing with user'spreference. The electronic-value storage unit 2122 and theelectronic-value accumulation unit 2154 are described by referring toFIG. 25 as follows.

As shown in FIG. 25, the electronic-value accumulation unit 2154includes an identifier column 2170, a service column 2172, and anelectronic-value column 2174. The identifier column 2170 is used forstoring service identifiers each associated with electronic couponsstored on the electronic-value column 2174. The service column 2172 isused for storing service names each associated with one of the serviceidentifiers. For each of the service identifiers, the electronic-valuecolumn 2174 is used for storing electronic coupons associated with theidentifier. A service identifier is typically an identifier identifyinga company issuing electronic coupons to be associated with the serviceidentifier. The name of the company is stored in the service column2172. Thus, for each of the service identifiers, the electronic-valuecolumn 2174 is used for storing electronic coupons issued by a companyidentified by the service identifier as coupons associated with theidentifier. When the electronic-value issuing server 114 issues anelectronic coupon to a user registered as a member of a service havingits name associated with a service identifier, typically, theelectronic-value issuing server 114 selects a coupon from thoseassociated with the service identifier on the basis of user's preferenceas a coupon to be issued to the user.

The electronic-value storage unit 2122 is used for storing electroniccoupons issued by the electronic coupon issuing server 124. As shown inFIG. 25, the electronic-value storage unit 2122 includes an identifiercolumn 2180 and an electronic-value column 2184. The identifier column2180 is used for storing service identifiers each associated withelectronic coupons. For each of the service identifiers, theelectronic-value column 2184 is used for storing electronic coupons. Toput it concretely, for example, when the electronic-value acquisitionunit 2120 receives a service identifier and an electronic coupon fromthe electronic-value issuing server 114, the electronic coupon is storedon the electronic-value storage unit 2122 by associating with theservice identifier.

Let us refer back to FIG. 23 to continue the explanation of the userportable terminal 102. The terminal electronic-value selection unit 2124functions as a unit for requesting the user to select a desiredelectronic coupon from those stored in the electronic-value storage unit2122. To put it concretely, let us assume that the user portableterminal 102 is a mobile telephone, a PDA, or the like and has inputmeans. In this case, the terminal electronic-value selection unit 2124requests the user to select a desired electronic coupon by operating theinput means or the like. The desired electronic coupon is a coupon thatthe user wants to transfer to another user. Then, the terminalelectronic-value selection unit 2124 acquires the selected electroniccoupon from the electronic-value storage unit 2122 and supplies thecoupon to the terminal electronic-value sender unit 2126. By having theconfiguration described above, the terminal electronic-value sender unit2126 is capable of transmitting only an electronic coupon desired by theuser even if the electronic-value storage unit 2122 contains a pluralityof stored electronic values.

The terminal electronic-value sender unit 2126 functions as a unit fortransmitting an electronic coupon received from the terminalelectronic-value selection unit 2124 to the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 104.

The terminal electronic-value receiver unit 2128 functions as a unit forreceiving an electronic coupon from the electronic-value distributionapparatus 104. Thus, as described above, the user portable terminal 102is capable of transmitting an electronic coupon to the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 104 and receiving an electronic coupon from theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104. In this way, a plurality ofuser portable terminals 102 each having an electronic coupon are capableof exchanging the coupons through the electronic-value distributionapparatus 104.

The user-identifier storage unit 2130 functions as a memory used forstoring an identifier uniquely identifying the user. The user-identifiersender unit 2132 functions as a unit for reading out the user identifierfrom the user-identifier storage unit 2130 and transmitting theidentifier to the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104.

The electronic-value distribution apparatus 104 has a configurationtypically including an electronic-value receiver unit 2140, anelectronic-value sender unit 2142, a distribution-information senderunit 2144, and a user-identifier receiver unit 2146. Theelectronic-value receiver unit 2140 functions as a unit for receiving anelectronic coupon from the user portable terminal 102 and passing on thecoupon to the electronic-value sender unit. The electronic-valuereceiver unit 2140 also supplies information on the received electroniccoupon to the distribution-information sender unit 2144. As describedbefore, the information on the received electronic coupon includes anidentifier identifying the coupon and a keyword representing thesubstance of the coupon.

The electronic-value sender unit 2142 functions as a unit fortransmitting an electronic coupon received from the electronic-valuereceiver unit to a user portable terminal 102.

The user-identifier receiver unit 2146 functions as a unit for receivingthe user identifier from a user portable terminal 102 and passing on theidentifier to the distribution-information sender unit. When theelectronic-value receiver unit receives an electronic coupon from theuser portable terminal 102, the user-identifier receiver unit 2146 alsoreceives the user identifier from the same user portable terminal 102and passes on the identifier to the distribution-information sender unit2144 as the user identifier serving as the sender of the coupon. Inaddition, when the electronic-value sender unit 2142 transmits anelectronic coupon to a user portable terminal 102 serving as therecipient of the transferred coupon, the user-identifier receiver unit2146 receives the user identifier from the recipient of the transferredcoupon and passes on the identifier to the distribution-informationsender unit 2144 as the user identifier serving as the recipient of thetransferred coupon.

The distribution-information sender unit 2144 functions as a unit forreceiving information on an electronic coupon from the electronic-valuereceiver unit 2140. Also, the distribution-information sender unit 2144functions as a unit for receiving the user identifier carrying a userportable terminal 102 serving as the sender of the coupon from theuser-identifier receiver unit 2146 and the user identifier carrying auser portable terminal 102 serving as the receiver of the coupon. Then,the distribution-information sender unit 2144 transmits the three piecesof information to the electronic-value issuing server 114 by associatingthe pieces of information with each other to form distributioninformation of electronic coupons.

It is to be noted that the distribution information transmitted by thedistribution-information sender unit 2144 to the electronic-valueissuing server 114 may include only either the user identifier carryinga user portable terminal 102 serving as the sender of a receivedelectronic coupon or the user identifier carrying a user portableterminal 102 serving as the receiver of a transferred coupon.

In addition, the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104 may includethe electronic-value selection unit (not shown) described above.

The electronic-value issuing server 114 has a configuration typicallyincluding an electronic-value issuing unit 2150, adistribution-information receiver unit 2152, the electronic-valueaccumulation unit 2154, and the preference-information storage unit2156. The distribution-information receiver unit 2152 functions as aunit for receiving distribution information of electronic coupons fromthe electronic-value distribution apparatus 104 and updating informationstored in the preference-information storage unit 2156 as user'spreference information on the basis of the received distributioninformation of electronic coupons. By referring to FIG. 24, thefollowing description explains a typical process carried out by thedistribution-information receiver unit 2152 to reflect the distributioninformation of electronic coupons in the user's preference information.

As shown in FIG. 24, the preference-information storage unit 2156includes a user-identifier column 2160 and a preference-informationcolumn 2162 associated each other. The user-identifier column 2160 isused for storing user IDs of users, which are each registered as amember in advance. The preference-information column 2162 is used forstoring user's preference information. The user's preference informationis information based on answers each given by the user as a response toa questionnaire or the like for example in a process to register theuser as a member, purchasing records of the user, and/or a result ofreflecting distribution information as will be described later.

As described above, the distribution-information sender unit 2152updates the preference-information storage unit 2156. In an exampleshown in FIG. 24, the distribution-information sender unit 2152 receivesdistribution information from the electronic-value distributionapparatus 104. The distribution information includes the user identifier“0004” of originating the transferred electronic coupon, the useridentifier “0003” of receiving the transferred electronic coupon, andthe information “Foreign SF” of electronic coupon. In this case, thedistribution-information sender unit 2152 deletes the “Foreign SF”electronic-coupon information from the user's preference informationidentified by the identifier of 00004 as a user of originating thetransferred electronic coupon. On the other hand, thedistribution-information sender unit 2152 adds the Foreign SFelectronic-coupon information to the user's preference informationidentified by the identifier of 00003 as a user of receiving thetransferred electronic coupon.

The electronic-value issuing unit 2150 functions as a unit for acquiringuser's preference information from the preference-information storageunit 2156, acquiring an electronic coupon according to the user'spreference information from the electronic-value accumulation unit 2154,and transmitting the coupon to a user portable terminal 102. Byreferring to FIGS. 24 and 25, the following description concretelyexplains a typical process to determine an electronic coupon to beissued to a user on the basis of user's preference information.

Let us assume for example that an attempt is made to issue an electroniccoupon to a user identified by the identifier of 00003. In this case,first of all, the electronic-value issuing unit 2150 acquiresuser-preference information associated with the user identifier of 00003from the preference-information storage unit 2156. For example, theuser-preference information associated with the user identifier of 00003includes Foreign SF and Foreign animation. Then, the electronic-valueissuing unit 2150 searches the electronic-value accumulation unit 2154by using keywords such as Foreign film, SF, and Foreign animation forelectronic values corresponding to the keywords. Let us assume forexample that the electronic-value issuing unit 2150 finds aforeign-animation discount coupon in the search process. In this case,the electronic-value issuing unit 2150 transmits the foreign-animationdiscount coupon to the user portable terminal 102 carried by the useridentified by the identifier of 00003.

It is to be noted that the user-preference information acquired from thepreference-information storage unit 2156 can also be used as a basis forcarrying out a data-mining process or the like in order to recognize atrend of user's preference. Then, the electronic-value accumulation unit2154 can be searched for an electronic coupon matching the trend ofuser's preference. As an alternative, instead of acquiring an electroniccoupon from the electronic-value accumulation unit, an electronic couponcan also be acquired typically from an information processing apparatusemployed by a company connected to the electronic-value issuing server114 by the communication network 112 as a company for issuing electroniccoupons to users.

The above description has explained the functional configurations of theuser portable terminal 102, the electronic-value issuing server 114, andthe electronic-value distribution apparatus 104. Next, by referring to aflowchart shown in FIG. 26, the following description explainsprocessing carried out in the electronic-value distribution system 100according to the embodiment to exchange an electronic coupon betweenuser portable terminals 102 and processing to transmit distributioninformation of the electronic coupon.

The flowchart begins with a step S2102 at which the electronic-valueissuing server 114 stores user's preference information in thepreference-information storage unit 2156 (S2102). Then, for example, theelectronic-value issuing server 114 transmits electronic coupons to asecond user portable terminal 102 b as coupons each matching a user'spreference identified by a user identifier (S2104). At a step S2106, thesecond user portable terminal 102 b receives the electronic coupons(S2106) and stores the coupons in the electronic-value storage unit 2122(S2108).

Then, the user selects a desired coupon from those stored in theelectronic-value storage unit 2122 for example by operating an inputunit employed in the second user portable terminal 102 (S2110).Subsequently, the second user portable terminal 102 b transmits theelectronic coupon selected by the user to the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 104 (S2112). At a step S2114, theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 receives the electroniccoupon and the user identifier from the second user portable terminal102 b (S2114). Then, a first user portable terminal 102 a supposed toreceive the electronic coupon transmitted from the second user portableterminal 102 b to the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104transmits the user identifier (S2116). At a step S2118, theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 receives the user identifierfrom the first user portable terminal 102 a (S2118). Then, theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 transmits the electroniccoupon received from the second user portable terminal 102 b to thefirst user portable terminal 102 a (S2120). At a step S2122, the firstuser portable terminal 102 a receives the electronic coupon from theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 (S2122). At this step, theprocess to transfer the electronic coupon from the second user portableterminal 102 b to the first user portable terminal 102 a is ended.

Then, the electronic-value distribution apparatus 104 transmits the useridentifier received from the second user portable terminal 102 b, theuser identifier received from the first user portable terminal 102 a andinformation on the transferred electronic coupon to the electronic-valueissuing server 114 by associating the identifiers and the informationwith each other (S2124). At a step S2126, the electronic-value issuingserver 114 receives the two user identifiers and the information on thetransferred electronic coupon from the electronic value distributionapparatus 104 (S2126). Then, the electronic-value issuing server 114updates the preference-information storage unit 2156 on the basis of thetwo user identifiers and the information on the transferred electroniccoupon (S2128).

The above description has explained the processing carried out in theelectronic-value distribution system 100 according to the embodiment toexchange an electronic coupon between the user portable terminals 102and the processing to transmit distribution information of theelectronic coupon.

By providing the electronic-value distribution system 100 according tothe first embodiment with the configuration described above, 2 or moreusers are capable of transferring and exchanging an electronic couponfrom one to another by using the user portable terminals 102 and theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 104 in order to distributecoupons to them. In addition, by having the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 104 transmit information on an electronic coupontransferred in a transfer process and the identifiers of users involvedin the transfer process to the electronic-value issuing server 114, theelectronic-value issuing server 114 is capable of grasping the state ofdistribution of an exchanged or transferred electronic coupon. As aresult, the electronic-value issuing server 114 is capable of reflectingthe state of the distribution in user's preference information referredat the time of issuing electronic coupon.

Second Embodiment

A second embodiment implements an electronic-value distribution system2200 which handles an electronic coupon as a typical electronic value,allows a user to exchange an unneeded electronic coupon with a desiredelectronic coupon, and is capable of reflecting information on anelectronic coupon exchanged during an exchange process in user'spreference information involved in the exchange process.

Since the entire configuration of the electronic-value distributionsystem 2200 is all but the same as the configuration of theelectronic-value distribution system 100 according to the firstembodiment, no explanation of the entire configuration of theelectronic-value distribution system 2200 is given. It is to be notedthat, in the case of the second embodiment, reference numerals 2202,2204, and 2214 denote respectively the user portable terminal, theelectronic-value distribution apparatus, and the electronic-valueissuing server.

First of all, the functional configurations of the user portableterminal 2202, electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204, andelectronic-value issuing server 2214, which are employed in the secondembodiment, are discussed by referring to FIG. 27. It is to be notedthat, since the hardware configurations are all but the same as thatemployed in the first embodiment, no explanation of the hardwareconfigurations is given.

The user portable terminal 2202 has a configuration typically includingan electronic-value acquisition unit 2220, an electronic-valueinputting/outputting unit 2221, an electronic-value storage unit 2222, aterminal electronic-value selection unit 2224, a terminalelectronic-value sender unit 2226, a terminal electronic-value receiverunit 2228, a user-identifier storage unit 2230, and a user-identifiersender unit 2232.

Since the configurations of the electronic-value acquisition unit 2220,the electronic-value storage unit 2222, the terminal electronic-valueselection unit 2224, the terminal electronic-value sender unit 2226, theterminal electronic-value receiver unit 2228, the user-identifierstorage unit 2230, and the user-identifier sender unit 2232 are all butthe same as those of their counterparts employed in the user portableterminal 102 according to the first embodiment, no explanations of themare given.

The electronic-value inputting/outputting unit 2221 functions as a unitfor acquiring an electronic coupon from the electronic-value storageunit 2222, transmitting the coupon to the electronic-value issuingserver 2214, acquiring an electronic coupon from the electronic-valueissuing server 2214, and storing the coupon in the electronic-valuestorage unit 2222. However, the electronic coupon received by theelectronic-value inputting/outputting unit 2221 from theelectronic-value issuing server 2214 is a coupon received before by theelectronic-value acquisition unit 2220 from the electronic-value issuingserver 2214, stored in the electronic-value storage unit 2222, andtransmitted by the electronic-value inputting/outputting unit 2221 tothe electronic-value issuing server 2214. That is to say, the electroniccoupon received by the electronic-value inputting/outputting unit 2221from the electronic-value issuing server 2214 is not a coupon newlyissued, but a coupon already issued from the electronic-value issuingserver 2214. For example, when too many electronic coupons are stored inthe electronic-value storage unit 2222, exceeding the storage capacityof the electronic-value storage unit 2222, the electronic-valueinputting/outputting unit 2221 transmits a coupon stored temporarily inthe electronic-value issuing server 2214.

By providing the configuration described above, the user can store onlyelectronic coupons required soon in the electronic-value storage unit2222 employed in the user portable terminal 2202 and temporarily keepcoupons, which are needed but not used soon, in the electronic-valueissuing server 2214. The user can then acquire such a coupon from theelectronic-value issuing server 2214 and store the coupon in theelectronic-value storage unit 2222 when the coupon becomes necessary.Thus, the user is capable of utilizing a number of electronic couponswithout regard to the storage size of the electronic-value storage unit2222 in the user portable terminal 2202, that is, even if the storagecapacity of the electronic-value storage unit 2222 is relatively small.

The electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 has a configurationtypically including an electronic-value receiver unit 2240, adistributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241, an electronic-valuesender unit 2242, a distributed-electronic-value selection unit 2243, adistributed-electronic-value extraction unit 2245, a user-identifierreceiver unit 2246, and a distribution-information sender unit 2244.

The electronic-value receiver unit 2240 functions as a unit forreceiving an electronic coupon from the user portable terminal 2202 andstoring the coupon in the distributed-electronic-value accumulationunit. In addition, the electronic-value receiver unit 2240 suppliesinformation on the electronic coupon received from the user portableterminal 2202 to the distribution-information sender unit 2244.

The distributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241 functions as amemory used for accumulating electronic coupons received by theelectronic-value receiver unit 2240. In addition, thedistributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241 is used foraccumulating not only electronic coupons received by theelectronic-value receiver unit 2240 from the user portable terminal2202, but also electronic coupons received by the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 2204 from the electronic-value issuing server2214 if necessary. To put it concretely, thedistributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241 typically has aconfiguration, which is about the same as that of the electronic-valueaccumulation unit 2154 explained before by referring to FIG. 25. Asshown in the figure, the distributed-electronic-value accumulation unit2241 thus stores a service identifier of the electronic coupon, aservice name corresponding to the identifier, and an electronic coupon.

The distributed-electronic-value extraction unit 2245 functions as aunit for extracting an electronic coupon from thedistributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241 as a coupon that canbe transmitted to the user portable terminal 2202 as a replacement ofanother electronic coupon received by the electronic-value receiver unit2240 from the user portable terminal 2202. To put it concretely, thedistributed-electronic-value extraction unit 2245 extracts an electroniccoupon, which has been issued by the same company issuing the otherelectronic coupon as evidenced by the fact that the electronic couponand the other electronic coupon are both associated with the sameservice identifier. As an alternative, if different companies setpredetermined electronic coupons as coupons exchangeable with each otherin advance, the distributed-electronic-value extraction unit 2245 isallowed to extract an electronic coupon as a replacement, not only whichhas been issued by the same company, but also which has been issued by acompany other than a company issuing the other electronic coupon as acoupon usable as a replacement for the other coupon. As anotheralternative, instead of identifying specific electronic coupons ascoupons replaceable with each other as described above, thedistributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241 can also beconfigured to function as a memory for storing only electronic couponsthat can each be used as a replacement. With such a configuration, thedistributed-electronic-value extraction unit 2245 can extract anyelectronic coupon from the distributed-electronic-value accumulationunit 2241.

The distributed-electronic-value selection unit 2243 functions as a unitfor letting the user select a desired electronic coupon from those,which have been extracted by the distributed-electronic-value extractionunit 2245 from the distributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241as described above. To put it concretely, let us assume for example thatthe distributed-electronic-value extraction unit 2245 extracts aplurality of electronic coupons from the distributed-electronic-valueaccumulation unit 2241 as coupons each transmittable to the userportable terminal 2202 for replacing another electronic coupon receivedby the electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 from the userportable terminal 2202. In this case, the distributed-electronic-valueselection unit 2243 displays the extracted electronic coupons on adisplay unit employed in the electronic-value distribution apparatus2204 and lets the user select one of the displayed coupons by operatingtypically an electronic-coupon selection unit employed in theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 2204.

The electronic-value sender unit 2242 functions as a unit fortransmitting an electronic coupon received from thedistributed-electronic-value selection unit 2243 to the user portableterminal 2202 as a coupon selected by the user. The electronic-valuesender unit 2242 also has a function to provide thedistribution-information sender unit 2244 with information on theelectronic coupon transmitted to the electronic-value sender unit 2242.

The user-identifier receiver unit 2246 functions as a unit for receivingthe user identifier from the user portable terminal 2202 and passing onthe identifier to the distribution-information sender unit. When theelectronic-value receiver unit receives an electronic coupon from theuser portable terminal 2202, the user-identifier receiver unit receivesthe user identifier from the user portable terminal 2202 and passes onthe identifier to the distribution-information sender unit 2244 as theuser identifier exchanging the coupon.

The distribution-information sender unit 2244 functions as a unit forreceiving information on a received electronic coupon from theelectronic-value receiver unit 2240, for receiving the user identifiercarrying a user portable terminal 2202 serving as the receiver of thereceived coupon from the user-identifier receiver unit 2246, forreceiving information on a transmitted electronic coupon from theelectronic-value sender unit 2242, and for transmitting the three piecesof information to the electronic-value issuing server 2214 byassociating the three pieces of information with each other to formdistribution information.

It is to be noted that the information transmitted by thedistribution-information sender unit 2244 to the electronic-valueissuing server 2214 as the distribution information may include eitherthe information on an electronic coupon received from the user portableterminal 2202 or the information on an electronic coupon transmitted tothe user portable terminal 2202.

The electronic-value issuing server 2214 has a configuration typicallyincluding an electronic-value issuing unit 2250, a distributioninformation receiver unit 2252, an electronic-value accumulation unit2254, a preference-information storage unit 2256, areserved-electronic-value inputting/outputting unit 2257, and anelectronic-value temporary storage unit 2259.

Since the electronic-value issuing unit 2250, the distributioninformation receiver unit 2252, and the preference-information storageunit 2256 have all but the same configurations as their respectivecounterparts employed in the electronic-value issuing server 114according to the first embodiment, no explanations are given.

The distribution information receiver unit 2252 functions as a unit forreceiving distribution information from the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 2204 and updating information stored in thepreference-information storage unit 2256 as user's preferenceinformation on the basis of the distribution information of electroniccoupons. In the case of the first embodiment, the distributioninformation receiver unit 2252 receives the user identifier serving asthe sender of the coupon, the user identifier serving as the receiver ofthe coupon, and information on the coupon itself. In the case of thesecond embodiment, on the other hand, the distribution informationincludes information on the replaced coupon received by theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 from a user portableterminal 2202, information on the coupon transmitted to the userportable terminal 2202, and the user identifier carrying the userportable terminal 2202.

Thus, the distribution information receiver unit 2252 updates thepreference information associated with the user identifier stored in thepreference-information storage unit 2256 on the basis of the receiveduser identifier. To put it concretely, for example, an electronic couponreceived by the electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 as a couponto be replaced from the user portable terminal 2202 is a coupon nolonger needed by a user. In this case, if information on the receivedelectronic coupon is stored as user's preference information, theinformation is deleted from the user's preference information since theuser can be assumed to have no interest in the coupon anymore. Asanother example, let us assume that a replacement electronic coupontransmitted by the electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 to theuser portable terminal 2202 is a coupon needed by a user. In this case,the information on the transmitted electronic coupon is added to theuser's preference information since the user can be assumed to haveinterest in the coupon.

As described above, by updating the user's preference information asdescribed above, it is possible to reflect changes in user's preferencein the user's preference information managed by the electronic-valueissuing server 2214. Thus, an electronic coupon better matching user'spreference can be issued to the user.

The reserved-electronic-value inputting/outputting unit 2257 functionsas a unit for receiving an electronic coupon from the user portableterminal 2202 and storing the coupon in the electronic-value temporarystorage unit 2259. In addition, the reserved-electronic-valueinputting/outputting unit 2257 also has a function to acquire anelectronic coupon from the electronic-value temporary storage unit 2259and transmit the coupon to the user portable terminal 2202 in accordancewith a request received from the user portable terminal 2202.

The electronic-value temporary storage unit 2259 functions as a memoryused for storing an electronic coupon received by thereserved-electronic-value inputting/outputting unit 2257 from the userportable terminal 2202 by including the coupon in a coupon groupassociated with a user. To put it concretely, the electronic-valueissuing unit 2250 typically includes a user-identifier column 2260 usedfor storing the identifiers of users and an electronic-value column 2262used for storing electronic coupons associated with each of the useridentifiers as shown in FIG. 28. Electronic coupons stored on theelectronic-value temporary storage unit 2259 are each a coupon alreadyissued by the electronic-value issuing unit 2250 before to a useridentified by the user identifier. Such electronic coupons are storedmerely on a temporary basis because too many electronic coupons have tobe stored in the electronic-value storage unit 2222 employed in the userportable terminal 2202 so that the storage capacity of theelectronic-value storage unit 2222 becomes insufficient. In accordancewith this configuration, user can temporary store an electronic couponor the like not needed soon in the electronic-value temporary storageunit.

In addition, the reserved-electronic-value inputting/outputting unit2257 may also store a user identifier, received electronic coupon, atransmitted electronic coupon, and an electronic-coupon transmitting andreceiving date/time on a log of electronic-value inputs/outputs. Bystoring them on a log, the electronic-value issuing server 2214 iscapable of grasping the input/output states of electronic coupons issuedto each user.

The above description has explained the functional configurations of theuser portable terminal 2202, electronic-value distribution apparatus2204, and electronic-value issuing server 214. Next, by referring to aflowchart shown in FIG. 29, the following description explainsprocessing carried out by the electronic-value distribution apparatus2204 employed in the electronic-value distribution system 2200 accordingto the embodiment to replace an electronic coupon with another and toprocess distribution information.

The flowchart begins with a step S2200 at which the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 2204 accumulates electronic coupons received froma plurality of user portable terminals in thedistributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241 (S2200). At a stepS2202, on the other hand, the electronic-value issuing server 2214stores user's preference information in the preference-informationstorage unit 2256 (S2202). Then, the electronic-value issuing server2214 transmits an electronic coupon meeting user's preference identifiedby a user identifier associated with the user portable terminal 2202(S2204). At a step S2206, the user portable terminal 2202 receives theelectronic coupon (S2206). Then, the user portable terminal 2202 storesthe electronic coupon in the electronic-value storage unit 2222 (S2208).

Subsequently, the user carrying the user portable terminal 2202 selectsan unneeded electronic coupon from those stored in the electronic-valuestorage unit 2222 by typically operating, for example, an input unitemployed in the user portable terminal 2202 (S2210). Then, the userportable terminal 2202 transmits the electronic coupon selected by theuser to the electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 (S2212). At astep S2214, the electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 receivesthe electronic coupon and the user identifier from the user portableterminal 2202 (S2214). Subsequently, the electronic-value distributionapparatus 2204 stores the electronic coupon in thedistributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241 (S2216). Then, theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 extracts electronic couponseach usable as a replacement of the received electronic coupon from thedistributed-electronic-value accumulation unit 2241 (S2218).Subsequently, the electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 lets theuser select one of the electronic coupons each usable as a replacementof the received electronic coupon (S2220). Then, the electronic-valuedistribution apparatus 2204 transmits the electronic coupon selected bythe user to the user portable terminal 2202 (S2222). At a step S2224,the user portable terminal 2202 receives the electric coupon desired bythe user from the electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204, endingthe processing to replace an unneeded electronic coupon with a desiredone (S2224).

At a step S2226, the electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204transmits three pieces of information, i.e, the information on thereceived electronic coupon, the information on the transmittedelectronic coupon, and the user identifier, to the electronic-valueissuing server 2214 by associating the three pieces of information witheach other (S2226).

At a step S2228, the electronic-value issuing server 2214 receives theuser identifier and the two pieces of information on the electroniccoupons from the electronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 (S2228).Then, the electronic-value issuing server 2214 updates thepreference-information storage unit 2256 on the basis of the useridentifier and the information on the electronic coupons (S2230).

The above description has explained processing carried out by theelectronic-value distribution apparatus 2204 employed in theelectronic-value distribution system 2200 according to the embodiment toreplace an electronic coupon with another and to process thedistribution information.

By configuring the electronic-value distribution system 2200 accordingto the second embodiment as described above, the user is capable ofreplacing an unneeded electronic coupon with a desired one by using theuser portable terminal 2202 and the electronic-value distributionapparatus 2204. In addition, the electronic-value distribution apparatus2204 transmits the user identifier carrying out the operation to replacethe unneeded electronic coupon with the desired one, the information onthe unneeded coupon, and the information on the desired coupon to theelectronic-value issuing server 2214. The electronic-value issuingserver 2214 is capable of knowing the replacement of the unneededelectronic coupon with the desired one and grasping the state ofdistributions of the coupons. Thus, the electronic-value issuing server2214 is capable of reflecting the state of distributions of the couponsin the preference information, which is referred to in a process toissue an electronic coupon.

In the embodiments described above, electronic coupons are each handledas a typical electronic value. It is to be noted, however, that theelectronic value is by no means limited to an electronic coupon. Theelectronic value can be any information provided by a commodity/serviceprovider to customers as long as the information has a financial value.An example of the electronic value is points given by acommodity/service provider to a customer purchasing a commodity or aservice in accordance with the price of a commodity and/or a service asinformation making the customer entitled to a discount on a commodity ora service in a next shopping activity or allowing the customer toexchange the points with a gift. Another example of the electronic valueis points that can be distributed to users or the like and exchangedbetween the users. It is to be noted that the functions of theelectronic-value distribution apparatus, the electronic-value issuingserver, and the user portable terminal can each be carried out byexecution of a computer program presentable to the user by recording theprogram on a recording medium, which can be read by a computer. Theabove explanation has explained electronic-value distribution systems.

The preferred embodiments of the present invention have been describedby referring to diagrams. It is needless to say, however, that the scopeof the present invention is by no means limited to the preferredembodiments. It is obvious that a person skilled in the art is capableof coming up with a variety of embodiment changes and embodimentcorrections within domains defined in the range of claims appended tothis patent specification. Nevertheless, such changes and correctionsare naturally interpreted as changes and corrections falling within thetechnological range.

INDUSTRIAL APPLICABILITY

The present invention can be applied to a preference-informationgathering system, an information searching apparatus, a user portableterminal, a passed-place-information sender apparatus, and apreference-information gathering apparatus. In particular, the presentinvention can be applied to for example a preference-informationgathering system for gathering information on every commodity/service,which are each inferred to be a commodity/service of interest to a user.

1. A preference-information gathering system for gathering user'spreference information, said preference-information gathering systemcomprising: an information searching apparatus capable of searching forinformation on every commodity and/or every service, which are eachdesired by said users; and a preference-information management serverconnected by a communication network to said information searchingapparatus and used for managing said information on preferences withsaid users; wherein said information searching apparatus includes acommodity/service-information storage unit for storing information oncommodities and/or services, a search-information inputting unit forrequesting a user to enter search information, a search-resultacquisition unit for searching said commodity/service-informationstorage unit for information desired by said user on the basis of saidsearch information, a user-identifier acquisition unit for acquiring auser identifier identifying said user entering said search informationto said search-information inputting unit, and a search-result senderunit for transmitting a search result acquired by said search-resultacquisition unit and said user identifier to said preference-informationmanagement server by associating said search result and said useridentifier with each other, whereas said preference-informationmanagement server includes a preference-information storage unit forstoring said user's preference information for each of said users, asearch-result receiver unit for receiving said search result and saiduser identifier from said information searching apparatus, and apreference-information updating unit for updating user-preferenceinformation stored in said preference-information storage unit on thebasis of said search result and said user identifier, which are receivedby said search-result receiver unit.
 2. A preference-informationgathering system for gathering user's preference information, saidpreference-information gathering system comprising: a user portableterminal, which can be carried by a user; and a preference-informationmanagement server connected by a communication network to said userportable terminal and used for managing said user's preferenceinformation; wherein said user portable terminal includes acommodity/service-identifier inputting unit for inputting an identifieridentifying a commodity and/or a service, a commodity/service-identifierstorage unit for storing said commodity/service identifier, and acommodity/service-information sender unit for transmitting saidcommodity/service identifier and a user identifier identifying said userto said preference-information management server by associating saidcommodity/service identifier and said user identifier with each other,whereas said preference-information management server includes apreference-information storage unit for storing said user's preferenceinformation for each of said users, a commodity/service-informationreceiver unit for receiving said commodity/service identifier and saiduser identifier from said user portable terminal, and apreference-information updating unit for updating user-preferenceinformation stored in said preference-information storage unit on thebasis of said commodity/service identifier and said user identifier,which are received by said commodity/service-information receiver unit.3. A preference-information gathering system for gathering user'spreference information, said preference-information gathering systemcomprising: a user portable terminal, which can be carried by a user; apassed-place-information sender apparatus carrying out communicationswith said user portable terminal; and a preference-informationmanagement server connected by a communication network to saidpassed-place-information sender apparatus and used for managing saiduser's preference information; wherein said user portable terminalincludes a user-identifier storage unit for storing a user identifieridentifying said user, said passed-place-information sender apparatusincludes a user-identifier acquisition unit for acquiring said useridentifier from said user portable terminal, and apassed-place-information sender unit for transmitting an apparatusidentifier identifying said passed-place-information sender apparatusand said user identifier to said preference-information managementserver by associating said apparatus identifier and said user identifierwith each other, whereas said preference-information management serverincludes a preference-information storage unit for storing said user'spreference information for each of said users, apassed-place-information receiver unit for receiving said apparatusidentifier and said user identifier from said passed-place-informationsender apparatus, and a preference-information updating unit forupdating user-preference information stored in saidpreference-information storage unit on the basis of said apparatusidentifier and said user identifier, which are received by saidpassed-place-information receiver unit.
 4. An information searchingapparatus, which is connected by a communication network to apreference-information management server for managing user's preferenceinformation and is used for providing information to be reflected insaid user's preference information to said preference-informationmanagement server, said information searching apparatus comprising: acommodity/service-information storage unit for storing information oncommodities and/or services; a search-information inputting unit forrequesting a user to enter search information; a search-resultacquisition unit for searching said commodity/service-informationstorage unit for information desired by said user on the basis of saidsearch information; a user-identifier acquisition unit for acquiring auser identifier identifying said user entering said search informationto said search-information inputting unit; and a search-result senderunit for transmitting a search result acquired by said search-resultacquisition unit and said user identifier to said preference-informationmanagement server by associating said search result and said useridentifier with each other.
 5. The information searching apparatusaccording to claim 4 wherein information stored in saidcommodity/service-information storage unit is a digital contentincluding a text, a stationary picture, a moving picture, and a sound,which are related to said commodity and/or said service.
 6. Theinformation searching apparatus according to claim 4, said informationsearching apparatus further having a search-result outputting unit foroutputting said search result.
 7. The information searching apparatusaccording to claim 4 wherein said search-information inputting unitreceives said search information from a user portable terminal havingsaid search information stored in a memory employed in said userportable terminal.
 8. The information searching apparatus according toclaim 4 wherein said user-identifier acquisition unit receives said useridentifier from a user portable terminal having said user identifierstored in a memory employed in said user portable terminal.
 9. Theinformation searching apparatus according to claim 4 wherein saidsearch-result sender unit transmits said search information itself tosaid preference-information management server if said search-resultacquisition unit is not capable of acquiring information desired by saiduser from said commodity/service-information storage unit on the basisof said search information.
 10. A computer program to be executed by acomputer functioning as an information searching apparatus, which isconnected by a communication network to a preference-informationmanagement server for managing user's preference information, is usedfor providing information to be reflected in said user's preferenceinformation to said preference-information management server, andcomprises: a commodity/service-information storage unit for storinginformation on commodities and/or services; a search-informationinputting unit for requesting a user to enter search information; asearch-result acquisition unit for searching saidcommodity/service-information storage unit for information desired bysaid user on the basis of said search information; a user-identifieracquisition unit for acquiring a user identifier identifying said userentering said search information to said search-information inputtingunit; and a search-result sender unit for transmitting a search resultacquired by said search-result acquisition unit and said user identifierto said preference-information management server by associating saidsearch result and said user identifier with each other.
 11. A userportable terminal, which can be carried by a user, is connected by acommunication network to a preference-information management server formanaging user's preference information and is used for providinginformation to be reflected in said user's preference information tosaid preference-information management server, said user portableterminal comprising: a commodity/service-identifier inputting unit forinputting an identifier identifying a commodity and/or a service; acommodity/service-identifier storage unit for storing saidcommodity/service identifier; and a commodity/service-information senderunit for transmitting said commodity/service identifier and a useridentifier identifying said user to said preference-informationmanagement server by associating said commodity/service identifier andsaid user identifier with each other.
 12. A computer program to beexecuted by a computer functioning as a user portable terminal, whichcan be carried by a user, is connected by a communication network to apreference-information management server for managing user's preferenceinformation, is used for providing information to be reflected in saiduser's preference information to said preference-information managementserver, and comprises: a commodity/service-identifier inputting unit forinputting an identifier identifying a commodity and/or a service; acommodity/service-identifier storage unit for storing saidcommodity/service identifier; and a commodity/service-information senderunit for transmitting said commodity/service identifier and a useridentifier identifying said user to said preference-informationmanagement server by associating said commodity/service identifier andsaid user identifier with each other.
 13. A passed-place-informationsender apparatus, which is connected by a communication network to apreference-information management server for managing user's preferenceinformation, is used for carrying communications with a user portableterminal a user can carry, and is used for providing information to bereflected in said user's preference information to saidpreference-information management server; said passed-place-informationsender apparatus comprising: a user-identifier acquisition unit foracquiring a user identifier identifying said user from said userportable terminal; and a passed-place-information sender unit fortransmitting an apparatus identifier identifying saidpassed-place-information sender apparatus and said user identifier tosaid preference-information management server by associating saidapparatus identifier and said user identifier with each other.
 14. Thepassed-place-information sender apparatus according to claim 13 whereinsaid user-identifier acquisition unit acquires said user identifier fromsaid user portable terminal by adoption of a non-contact communication.15. The passed-place-information sender apparatus according to claim 13,said passed-place-information sender apparatus further having atransmission determining unit for determining whether or not to transmitsaid user identifier acquired by said user-identifier acquisition unitto said preference-information management server on the basis of saiduser identifier itself.
 16. A computer program to be executed by acomputer functioning as a passed-place-information sender apparatus,which is connected by a communication network to apreference-information management server for managing user's preferenceinformation, is used for carrying communications with a user portableterminal a user can carry, is used for providing information to bereflected in said user's preference information to saidpreference-information management server, and comprises: auser-identifier acquisition unit for acquiring a user identifieridentifying said user from said user portable terminal; and apassed-place-information sender unit for transmitting an apparatusidentifier identifying said passed-place-information sender apparatusand said user identifier to said preference-information managementserver by associating said apparatus identifier and said user identifierwith each other.
 17. A preference-information gathering method forgathering user's preference information, said preference-informationgathering method implemented by using: an information searchingapparatus capable of searching for information on every commodity and/orevery service, which are each desired by said users; and apreference-information management server for managing said user'spreference information; wherein said information searching apparatusexecutes processes of: storing information on commodities and/orservices in a commodity/service-information storage unit in advance;requesting a user to enter search information; acquiring a useridentifier identifying said user entering said search information;searching said commodity/service-information storage unit for a searchresult representing information desired by said user on the basis ofsaid search information; and transmitting said search result and saiduser identifier to said preference-information management server byassociating said search result and said user identifier with each other,whereas said preference-information management server executes processesof: receiving said search result and said user identifier from saidinformation searching apparatus; and updating user-preferenceinformation stored in a preference-information storage unit for storingsaid user's preference information on the basis of said search resultand said user identifier, which are received from said informationsearching apparatus.
 18. The preference-information gathering methodaccording to claim 17 wherein information stored in saidcommodity/service-information storage unit is a digital contentincluding a text, a stationary picture, a moving picture, and a sound,which are related to said commodity and/or said service.
 19. Thepreference-information gathering method according to claim 17 whereinsaid information searching apparatus further executes a process ofoutputting said search result.
 20. The preference-information gatheringmethod according to claim 17 wherein said process of requesting a userto enter search information includes a process of receiving said searchinformation from a user portable terminal having said search informationstored in a memory employed in said user portable terminal.
 21. Thepreference-information gathering method according to claim 17 whereinsaid process of acquiring a user identifier identifying a user enteringsearch information includes a process of receiving said user identifierfrom a user portable terminal having said user identifier stored in amemory employed in said user portable terminal.
 22. Thepreference-information gathering method according to claim 17 whereinsaid process of transmitting a search result and a user identifier tosaid preference-information management server by associating said searchresult and said user identifier with each other is executed to transmitsearch information itself to said preference-information managementserver if said process of searching said commodity/service-informationstorage unit for a search result representing information desired by auser on the basis of said search information does not produce saidinformation desired by a user as said search result.
 23. Apreference-information gathering method for gathering user's preferenceinformation, said preference-information gathering method implemented byusing: a user portable terminal, which can be carried by a user; and apreference-information management server for managing said user'spreference information; wherein said user portable terminal executesprocesses of: inputting an identifier identifying a commodity and/or aservice; storing said commodity/service identifier in acommodity/service-identifier storage unit; and transmitting saidcommodity/service identifier and a user identifier identifying said userto said preference-information management server by associating saidcommodity/service identifier and said user identifier with each other,whereas said preference-information management server executes processesof: receiving said commodity/service identifier and said user identifierfrom said user portable terminal; and updating user-preferenceinformation stored in a preference-information storage unit for storingsaid user's preference information on the basis of saidcommodity/service identifier and said user identifier, which arereceived from said user portable terminal.
 24. Thepreference-information gathering method according to claim 23 whereinsaid identifier identifying a commodity and/or a service is included ineither a two-dimensional barcode or an IC tag.
 25. Apreference-information gathering method for gathering user's preferenceinformation, said preference-information gathering method implemented byusing: a user portable terminal, which can be carried by a user; apassed-place-information sender apparatus carrying out communicationswith said user portable terminal; and a preference-informationmanagement server connected by a communication network to saidpassed-place-information sender apparatus and used for managing saiduser's preference information; wherein said user portable terminalexecutes a process of storing a user identifier identifying said user ina user-identifier storage unit; said passed-place-information senderapparatus executes processes of: acquiring said user identifier fromsaid user portable terminal; and transmitting an apparatus identifieridentifying said passed-place-information sender apparatus and said useridentifier to said preference-information management server byassociating said apparatus identifier and said user identifier with eachother, whereas said preference-information management server executesprocesses of: receiving said apparatus identifier and said useridentifier from said passed-place-information sender apparatus; andupdating user-preference information stored in a preference-informationstorage unit for storing said user's preference information on the basisof said apparatus identifier and said user identifier, which arereceived from said passed-place-information sender apparatus.
 26. Thepreference-information gathering method according to claim 25 whereinsaid passed-place-information sender apparatus executes said process ofacquiring said user identifier from said user portable terminal byadoption of a non-contact communication.
 27. The preference-informationgathering method according to claim 25 wherein saidpassed-place-information sender apparatus also executes a process ofdetermining whether or not to transmit said acquired user identifier tosaid preference-information management server on the basis of said useridentifier itself.